Saints To Inspire and Aid Us - June 26, 2022

Welcome back, after a long hiatus, to good ole Ordinary Time. We deacons and priests will be wearing green for the next several months of Sundays. Time to settle in and be Ordinary!

Even so, we have some interesting Saints Days this coming week.

MONDAY we celebrate St. Cyril of Alexandria (376-444). He was Bishop in Alexandria (Egypt, not Virginia). Alexandria was the Harvard, Princeton, Oxford, and Cambridge of its day, and was a hub of intellectual activity and theological ferment. Cyril strongly opposed another Bishop, Nestorios, who was Bishop of Constantinople, the capital of the Eastern Roman Empire. Nestorios taught that Mary was the Mother of Jesus, but NOT the Mother of God. Cyril hit the roof when he heard this, because he realized that if you could separate the human and divine natures in Jesus, then we were not saved. Jesus had to be divine in order to SAVE us, and to be human to save US. Well Cyril won this debate when Mary was declared “Mother of God” at the Council of Ephesus (in Turkey) in 431. He had a very exciting life with several other controversies.

TUESDAY we celebrate one of my favorite Saints, Irenaeus. He too was a Bishop, of Lyon in France (130 – 202). His name means “peacemaker” and he lived up to his name. He wrote apologetic works against the heresy of the Gnostics, who taught that they were saved by secret knowledge. Irenaeus emphasized the goodness of God against others who promoted an angry God, and his most famous quote is “God’s greatest glory is man (or the person) fully alive.” Irenaeus promoted a positive view of God and salvation in the face of those who promoted an angry and vengeful God. So I like
St. Irenaeus.

WEDNESDAY we have the Solemnity of Sts. Peter and Paul. You should, I hope, know who these two gentlemen are. There are statues of them on either side of the altar in our church. Peter and Paul did not always agree (see Galatians 2:11-14). But they both labored hard for the spread of the Good News of God’s love for us in Jesus Christ. And they both gave their lives for the faith, both being martyred in Rome. This is a very good day to pray for healing of the rifts and divisions in the church (of which there are now plenty), and that all Catholics and Christians will be united in proclaiming our faith in Jesus as Son of God and Savior.

THURSDAY we celebrate the First Martyrs of the Church of Rome. In 64 AD under the Emperor Nero many Christians were tortured, crucified, and burned alive in Nero’s garden on the Vatican Hill. These martyrs guaranteed with their blood the faith that Sts. Peter and Paul had preached to them. 

FRIDAY we celebrate St. Junípero Serra, OFM. He was a Spanish missionary (November 24, 1713 – August 28, 1784) who established missions in what is now the State of California. He was canonized (declared a Saint) only recently, on September 23, 2015. He evangelized the native peoples of California and baptized over 6,000
native Californians. His canonization is not without controversy, as the treatment of native peoples at the time does not match our sense of fairness and respect. Paulist Father Tom Gibbons, who recently had the successful showing here of his movie about Fr. Bud Kieser, CSP, “Hollywood Priest”, is currently working on a documentary of the life of St. Junípero Serra and investigating the causes of the controversy over Serra’s canonization. Stay tuned!

So all in all this is a good week to remember the Saints, be inspired by their example, and ask for their prayers and aid.

God bless! 

St. Cyril of Alexandria


St. Irenaus


Sts. Peter & Paul


1st Martyrs


St. Junípero Serra