Friday of the Third Week in Ordinary Time

Year of the Family "Amoris Laetitia The Joy of Love"

Saint: Saint Thomas Aquinas, Student of Saint Albert the Great, Priest, Doctor (1225-1274)

Readings of the Day

Rule of Saint Benedict: Ch 7:19-23 Humility

Mass: 2 Sm 11:1-4a, 5-10a, 13-17; Resp Ps 51; Mk 4:26-34

Thoroughly wash me from my guilt.

MARY, QUEEN OF DOCTORS,

PRAY FOR US.

With yet more to celebrate, today we commemorate the great Saint Thomas Aquinas, also known as Doctor Angelicus, Doctor Communis, and Doctor Universalis, another saint who put his light on the lampstand where it belongs. And that light continues to shine brightly. Thanks be to God. We pray for Dominicans throughout the world, members of the Order of Preachers, all nuns, sisters, friars, and also the students, staff, and professors at the Pontifical University of Saint Thomas Aquinas in Rome, commonly called, the Angelicum.

It is a good day to turn to anything that Saint Thomas Aquinas wrote, and it surely isn't difficult to find something. I usually open the Summa Theologica and here it is open to II-II, Q. 83, Of Prayer. It will keep anyone engaged with its Seventeen Articles. It works well as Saint Benedict's teaching on Humility in Ch 7, that we are busy with these days, refers to the Lord's Prayer in one of the verses assigned for today. Thomas Aquinas was closely connected to Saint Benedict too, as he was sent to the great Benedictine Abbey of Monte Cassino at the age of five and was there until he was thirteen. His parents wanted their son to be a Benedictine, and perhaps even the Abbot of Monte Cassino. As it turned out, Thomas's vocation lay elsewhere. In verse 20 of the Holy Rule, Benedict writes, "in the Prayer too we ask God that His will be done in us." In Q. 83, article 9, Thomas Aquinas writes this about "the Prayer", that is, the Lord's Prayer: "The Lord's Prayer is most perfect, because, as Augustine says, if we pray rightly and fittingly, we can say nothing else but what is contained in this prayer of Our Lord."

And while we are on the most perfect Lord's Prayer, we might turn to articles 7 and 8 of Q. 83. Thomas answers two questions: "Whether we ought to pray for others?" (art. 7), and "Whether we ought to pray for our enemies?" (art. 8). Should we pray for others? Thomas Aquinas answers: "When we pray we ought to ask for what we desire. Now we ought to desire good things not only for ourselves, but also for others: for this is essential to the love which we owe to our neighbor ... therefore charity requires us to pray for others." Should we pray for our enemies? Thomas Aquinas answers: "To pray for another is an act of charity, as stated above. Wherefore we are bound to pray for our enemies in the same manner as we are bound to love them." Amen. 

SAINT THOMAS AQUINAS,

SAINT ALBERT THE GREAT,

SAINT BENEDICT,

PRAY FOR US.

Today's photo: Another look at the beauty at our front entrance, with a glimpse of the magnificent sky above.

© Gertrude Feick 2022