St. Jane Frances de Chantal

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Monday, 12 August 2024 : 19th Week of Ordinary Time, Memorial of St. Jane Frances de Chantal, Religious (Psalm)

Liturgical Colour : Green or White (Religious)

Psalm 148 : 1-2, 11-12, 13, 14

Alleluia! Praise the Lord from the heavens; praise Him in the heavenly heights. Praise Him, all His Angels; praise Him, all His heavenly hosts.

Kings of the earth and nations, princes and all rulers of the world, young men and maidens, old and young together.

Let them praise the Name of the Lord. For His Name alone is exalted; His majesty is above earth and heaven.

He has given His people glory; He has a praise to His faithful, to Israel, the people close to Him. Alleluia.

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Monday, 12 August 2024 : 19th Week of Ordinary Time, Memorial of St. Jane Frances de Chantal, Religious (First Reading)

Liturgical Colour : Green or White (Religious)

Ezekiel 1 : 2-5, 24-28c

On the fifth of the month (it was the fifth year of the exile of king Jehoiachin) the word of YHVH came to Ezekiel, son of Buzi, the priest, in the land of the Chaldeans by the banks of the Kebar. There the hand of YHVH was upon me.

I looked : a windstorm came from the north bringing a great cloud. A fiery light inside it lit up all around it, while at the centre there was something like a glowing metal. In the centre were what appeared to be four creatures with the same form.

I heard the noise of their wings when they moved, similar to the roar of many waters, similar to the voice of the Most High, the noise of a multitude or of a camp. When they were not moving they lowered their wings. I heard a noise above the platform over their heads. Above it was a Throne resembling a sapphire; and high on this Throne was a Figure similar to that of a Man.”

“Then I saw a light as of a glowing bronze, as if fire enveloped Him from His waist upwards. And from His waist downwards it was as if fire give radiance around Him. The surrounding light was like a rainbow in the clouds after a day of rain. This vision was the likeness of YHVH’s glory. On seeing it I fell on my face.

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Saturday, 12 August 2023 : 18th Week of Ordinary Time, Memorial of St. Jane Frances de Chantal, Religious (Homily and Scripture Reflections)

Liturgical Colour : Green or White (Religious or Saturday Mass of Our Lady)

Dear brothers and sisters in Christ, today as we listened to the words of the Scriptures, we are all reminded to continue to be faithful in God and to trust in Him at all times. We should do whatever we can to walk faithfully in His Presence, doing His will and obeying His commandments. Each one of us as God’s people, all of us have been called to holiness and entrusted with the Law and commandments that He has given us because we have received His truth and Good News, and the teachings and explanations of those same truths through the Church, which had preserved the Good News from the Lord and His Apostles, and also through the Wisdom and the knowledge granted to us through the Holy Spirit that has been sent unto us, dwelling in us, as God Himself has come down to dwell with us and within us. How can we then, as His beloved and holy people, act in ways that are contrary to His path? Unfortunately, many of us are still lacking in strong and truly genuine faith, and have acted waywardly and away from the Lord’s true path.

In our first reading today, taken from the Book of Deuteronomy, we continue to hear the reminders said by Moses to the whole assembly of the people of Israel, after the discourse that he went through with them in our first reading yesterday, telling them of the greatness of God and all the love which He has imparted upon them, all the wonderful things that He has done for their sake, in guiding and leading them through their darkest and most difficult moments. He had performed many signs and wonders, crushing all the enemies and opponents of His people, protecting them all from hardships and challenges, persecutions and oppressions, providing them with food and sustenance, drink and help throughout the entire journey in the desert, providing and loving them even as He chastised and punished them for their disobedience, rebellions and stubborn attitude, in refusing to obey Him and in disobeying His Law and in their betrayals against Him.

Today, we then heard from Moses reminding the people that the Lord, YHVH, alone is their God, and they should only worship and follow Him alone, and remember the Law and commandments that He had given all of them. He reminded the people of everything that God had promised to their ancestors, the Covenant that He has established with Abraham, Isaac and Jacob, and which He had remembered and was fulfilling at that very moment, through His guidance and deliverance of all of the Israelites from their enslavement in Egypt, leading them each day by hand, to the land that He has promised to the same Abraham, Isaac and Jacob, and to their descendants. Moses reminded all of them that even in the good times that they would be having in the future, when they were well-fed and taken care of, in the blessed new lands they would live in, they must never forget about God and continue to follow Him faithfully as they should always do.

Each and every one of them should have strong and enduring faith in Him, as faith is something that anchors us to God and to His truth, His path and His love. As we all heard from our Gospel passage today, the Lord Jesus chastised some of His disciples for not having enough faith in Him, and therefore failed to cast out evil spirits and demons that had possessed a young boy. The disciples had been entrusted and given the power and authority to heal, perform miracles and other great works, including casting out demons and evil spirits, and yet, it was likely that at that moment, they had grown proud and forgot about whose power and authority by which they had performed all those miracles, and perhaps, they thought that it came from their own power and strength, or that when the evil spirits proved to be resilient and strong, they faltered and gave in to fear, and that was likely why they could not cast those out from the young boy.

Therefore, that was why the Lord chastised and reminded the disciples that they must first have strong faith and trust in Him, so that they may indeed do what God has commanded and entrusted for them to do. The same therefore applies to each and every one of us, the members of His Church as well. All of us as Christians have been called to remember our Lord and all that He had done for us, the Covenant and the enduring love that He has always ever shown unto us, from the very beginning, and how He even sent us His deliverance through His Son, Jesus Christ, to be our Saviour and Guide. Through Him, His works, and ultimately His suffering and death on the Cross, the Lord has led us all from the darkness and tyranny of sin and death, into a new life and existence blessed and full of His grace, free from evil, and free to live once again as children of God’s light and truth.

Brothers and sisters in Christ, each and every one of us are called and challenged to follow the Lord wholeheartedly, and we are all called to be great role models, inspirations and examples for each other, in how we live our lives, so that others may see God’s light and know His truth, through our every actions, words and deeds. And today, all of us should be inspired by the great examples set before us by our holy predecessors, particularly that of St. Jane Frances de Chantal, a holy woman of God whose feast we are celebrating today. St. Jane Frances de Chantal was born into a noble family in what is now France, and was a woman of high standing and reputation, who married another noble, Baron de Chantal who was killed early on, which left St. Jane Frances de Chantal as a widow at a young age with several children.

St. Jane Frances de Chantal took good care of her family, while at the same time establishing a new order for women who had been rejected because of them being in poor health or by being advanced in age by the order religious orders. The sanctity and great examples showed by St. Jane Frances de Chantal who dedicated herself to the cause of the Lord, inspired many others to follow her and her good examples, in serving God and in doing His commandments and Law. Many came to be convinced to be followers of Christ, and many still came to join the order that St. Jane Frances de Chantal had established, and performed so many wonderful things to the people of God. She also showed us all what it truly means for us to be faithful as Christians, in doing God’s will at all times, and in following God’s commandments and Law, living a life truly holy and worthy of God.

May the Lord continue to bless and guide us all as He has always ever done, all these while. May God be with us always and may He empower and help each one of us in our journey of faith and life, now and always, inspired as always by the saints and the holy men and women who came before us. Amen.

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Saturday, 12 August 2023 : 18th Week of Ordinary Time, Memorial of St. Jane Frances de Chantal, Religious (Gospel Reading)

Liturgical Colour : Green or White (Religious or Saturday Mass of Our Lady)

Matthew 17 : 14-20

At that time, when Jesus and His disciples came to the crowd, a man approached Him, knelt before Him and said, “Sir, have pity on my son, who is an epileptic and suffers terribly. He has often fallen into the fire, and at other times into the water. I brought him to Your disciples but they could not heal him.”

Jesus replied, “O you people, faithless and misled! How long must I be with you? How long must I put up with you? Bring him here to Me.” And Jesus commanded the evil spirit to leave the boy, and the boy was immediately healed. Later, the disciples approached Jesus and asked Him privately, “Why could we not drive out the spirit?”

Jesus said to them, “Because you have little faith. I say to you : if only you had faith the size of a mustard seed, you could tell that mountain to move from here to there, and the mountain would obey. Nothing would be impossible for you.”

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Saturday, 12 August 2023 : 18th Week of Ordinary Time, Memorial of St. Jane Frances de Chantal, Religious (Psalm)

Liturgical Colour : Green or White (Religious or Saturday Mass of Our Lady)

Psalm 17 : 2-3a, 3bc-4, 47 and 51ab

I love You, o YHVH, my strength. YHVH is my Rock, my Fortress, my Deliverer and my God.

He is the Rock in Whom I take refuge. He is my Shield, my powerful Saviour, my Stronghold. I call on YHVH, Who is worthy of praise : He saves me from my enemies!

YHVH lives! Praised be my Rock! Exalted be my Saviour God. He has given victories to His king; He has shown His love to His anointed ones.

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Saturday, 12 August 2023 : 18th Week of Ordinary Time, Memorial of St. Jane Frances de Chantal, Religious (First Reading)

Liturgical Colour : Green or White (Religious or Saturday Mass of Our Lady)

Deuteronomy 6 : 4-13

Listen, Israel : YHVH, our God, is One YHVH. And you shall love YHVH, your God, with all your heart, with all your soul and with all your strength. Engrave on your heart the commandments that I pass on to you today.

Repeat them over and over to your children, speak to them when you are at home and when you travel, when you lie down and when you rise. Brand them on your hand as a sign and keep them always before your eyes. Engrave them on your doorposts and on your city gates.

Do not forget YHVH when He has led you into the land which He promised to your fathers, to Abraham, Isaac and Jacob; for He will give you great and prosperous cities which you did not build, houses filled with everything good which you did not provide, wells which you did not dig, vineyards and olive groves which you did not plant.

So when you have eaten and have been satisfied, do not forget YHVH Who brought you out from Egypt where you were enslaved. Fear YHVH, your God, serve Him and call on His Name when you have to swear an oath.

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Friday, 12 August 2022 : 19th Week of Ordinary Time, Memorial of St. Jane Frances de Chantal, Religious (Homily and Scripture Reflections)

Liturgical Colour : Green or White (Religious)

Dear brothers and sisters in Christ, today as we listened to the words of the Scriptures we are all presented with the words of the Lord calling on us to guard ourselves against all sorts of worldly temptations, and in particular today we are called to focus our attention on the sin of the flesh, the desire that we mankind often have for the pleasures of the body, which led us down the path of sin and wickedness as we are often tempted to seek for the worldly pleasures first and ignoring the Lord’s truth and teachings. That is also why many people had ended up being deep in the state of sin, as well as breaking up families and relationships.

In our first reading today taken from the Book of the prophet Ezekiel, we heard the Lord speaking to His people through Ezekiel regarding all that He had done for them, for all the years and ages, throughout all the generations. He had made His Covenant with them, blessed them and gave them and their ancestors much blessing and bounty, providence and help, as He rescued them, took good care of them, guided them, purified and made them clean again when they had erred and fallen into the wrong paths. He rescued them from their enemies and struck their enemies down before them, guarding and strengthening them, giving them glory and joy.

Yet, as we heard the Lord spoke, He showed His frustrations and lamentations at how those same people continued to be wayward, rejecting Him and His ways, choosing instead to forge their own path and committing whatever is wicked in the sight of God and men alike. They worshipped the pagan idols and gods, persecuted God’s prophets and messengers who had been sent to them to guide them and remind them to stay faithful to the truth of God. The people had chosen to trust in their own strength and judgment, turning deaf ear to the Lord’s call. Yet, the Lord was still ever patient and continued to reach out to them nonetheless.

That was what He told the people through Ezekiel, as He presented this truth to the people in exile in Babylon, reminding them that God still loved all of them regardless, and wanted to reach out to them, embracing them with love and forgiving them their sins. He would renew His Covenant with them, which He had always ever been faithful to, all those years, if only the people were willing to listen to Him, hearken to His call and answer Him with faith. The Lord has always been generous with His love, compassion and mercy, and in the end it is really up to those people to embrace what God had generously given and presented to them.

In our Gospel passage today, we heard from the Lord speaking to the Pharisees with regards to their question whether divorce was lawful or not according to the Law and whether it should be allowed or not. The Lord then highlighted the fact that the Law of God as revealed through Moses had been modified and changed according to the preferences of the people, as even Moses himself was scandalised by the behaviour of the Israelites back then, who hardened their hearts against God and gave them some concessions so as to help them accept the Law of God better, but those concessions ended up making them even more complacent and in the end, misunderstanding the whole purpose and intention of the Law.

And as today we focus on the matter of familial relationship, marriage and also obedience to God, we are all reminded how God had always intended for us to do His will, and each one of us as the Lord highlighted in His words, had our own particular calling and vocation in life. For those who have been called to married life, that bond of marriage as the Lord had defined it, is everlasting and unbreakable, and one who sought to break that bond with the reason other than that is acceptable, such as the desire to marry another person, is essentially committing a sin against God, the sin of adultery for both parties involved.

The Lord highlighted that there are also others called to different calling and purposes in life, such as those who are destined for a life of service to God, and many among them will remain unmarried, and instead dedicating themselves wholly to God and His people. What is important here is that, whatever it is that God has called us to do, in our various vocation and calling in life, each one of us are called to listen to God and to dedicate ourselves more to Him, and to listen to Him earnestly, not hardening our hearts and minds against Him as our predecessors had often done. We should also resist the many temptations present all around us, in the desire and pressure to seek worldly pleasures and satisfaction among other things.

Today, all of us should be inspired by the examples shown by St. Jane Frances de Chantal, who was once a mother to several children and was widowed in early age due to her husband’s unfortunate early death, and she dedicated herself to God from then on through charitable works and missions, and she was inspired through an encounter with another saint, St. Francis de Sales. She eventually founded a religious congregation known as the Congregation or Order of the Visitation of Holy Mary. All its members are called to live the charism and works of its founder, St. Jane Frances de Chantal who desired to care for the needy and the less fortunate in the community, and they were remembered as the sisters who spent more of their time in mission than cloistered in a monastery.

Brothers and sisters in Christ, as St. Jane Frances de Chantal and surely many other saints, holy men and women of God had shown us by their own lives, their dedication and commitment to God, we are all reminded and called to do our best in whatever capacity and opportunity we have been presented with by God, and to be exemplary and source of inspiration ourselves to our fellow brethren, in how we live our lives and in how we seek the Lord with faith, in each and every moments of our daily living. May God be with us all and may He strengthen each one of us with the resolve to live ever more courageously in His path. Amen.

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Friday, 12 August 2022 : 19th Week of Ordinary Time, Memorial of St. Jane Frances de Chantal, Religious (Gospel Reading)

Liturgical Colour : Green or White (Religious)

Matthew 19 : 3-12

At that time, some Pharisees approached Jesus. They wanted to test Him and asked, “Is a man allowed to divorce his wife for any reason he wants?”

Jesus replied, “Have you not read that, in the beginning, the Creator made them male and female? And the Creator said : Therefore, a man shall leave father and mother, and be joined to his wife, and the two shall become one body. So, they are no longer two, but one body. Let no one separate what God has joined.”

They asked him, “Then why did Moses command us to write a bill of dismissal in order to divorce?” Jesus replied, “Moses knew the hardness of your hearts, so he allowed you to divorce your wives; but it was not so in the beginning. Therefore, I say to you : whoever divorces his wife, unless it be for immorality, and marries another, commits adultery.”

The disciples said, “If that is the condition of a married man, it is better not to marry.” Jesus said to them, “Not everybody can accept what you have just said, but only those who have received this gift. There are eunuchs born so, from their mother’s womb. Some have been made that way by others. But there are some who have given up the possibility of marriage, for the sake of the kingdom of heaven. Let the one who can accept it, accept it.”

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Friday, 12 August 2022 : 19th Week of Ordinary Time, Memorial of St. Jane Frances de Chantal, Religious (Psalm)

Liturgical Colour : Green or White (Religious)

Isaiah 12 : 2-3, 4bcd, 5-6

He is the God of my salvation; in Him I trust and am not afraid, YHVH is my strength : Him I will praise, the One Who saved me.

You will draw water with joy from the very fountain of salvation. Then you will say : “Praise to the Lord, break into songs of joy for Him, proclaim His marvellous deeds among the nations and exalt His Name.”

“Sing to the Lord : wonders He has done, let these be known all over the earth. Sing for joy, o people of Zion, for great in your midst is the Holy One of Israel.”

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Friday, 12 August 2022 : 19th Week of Ordinary Time, Memorial of St. Jane Frances de Chantal, Religious (First Reading)

Liturgical Colour : Green or White (Religious)

Ezekiel 16 : 1-15, 60, 63

The word of YHVH came to me in these terms, “Son of man, make known to Jerusalem its sins. You say on My behalf : Your beginning was in Canaan; there, you were born. Your father was an Amorite and your mother a Hittite. On the day you were born, your cord was not cut; you were not bathed in water to make you clean; you were not rubbed with salt, nor were you wrapped in cloth.”

“There was no one to look with pity on you; or compassionate enough, to give you any of these attentions. You were left, exposed, in the open fields; because you were looked upon with disgust, on the day you were born. But I passed by; and saw you, immersed in your blood. I said to you, in the midst of your blood, ‘Live!’”

“I made you grow, like a plant of the field. You grew up and became tall; and were becoming of marriageable age. Your breasts were formed and your hair had grown; but you were naked and exposed. I passed by later, and saw, you were at the age of love; and spread part of My garment over you, to cover your nudity. I made a Covenant with you with an oath – word of YHVH – and you were Mine.”

“Then I bathed you in water; I cleansed you of your blood and anointed you with oil. I clothed you with embroidered cloth and put soft leather sandals on your feet. I dressed you in fine linen and covered you with silk. I adorned you with jewelry, putting bracelets on your arms, a necklace around your neck and a ring in your nose. I gave you earrings and a magnificent crown for your head.”

“You were adorned with gold and silver; your clothing was fine linen, silk and embroidered cloth. You were fed on finest flour, honey and oil; you became very beautiful and rose to be queen. Your beauty was perfect; and your renown spread through the nations, because of the splendour I had given you – word of YHVH.”

“But you relied on your beauty; you trusted in your fame; and you began to give yourself to every passerby, like a prostitute. But I will remember My Covenant with you in the days of your youth, and, make in your favour, an eternal Covenant, so that you may remember, be ashamed, and never open your mouth again, because of your humiliation, when I have pardoned you for all you have done,” word of YHVH.

Alternative reading

Ezekiel 16 : 59-63

For thus says YHVH : “I will treat you as you deserve; you, who despised the oath and broke the Covenant. But I will remember My Covenant with you in the days of your youth, and, make in your favour, an eternal Covenant. You will be mindful of your ways and be ashamed, when I take your sisters, both the elder and the younger; and give them to you as daughters, without prejudice to My Covenant with you.”

“For I will uphold My Covenant with you; and you will know that I am YHVH, so that you may remember, be ashamed, and never open your mouth again, because of your humiliation, when I have pardoned you for all you have done,” word of YHVH.