9 October 2026 Friday of the Twenty-seventh Week in Ordinary Time or Optional Memorial on Saint John Henry Newman, Priest and Doctor of the Church or Optional Memorial of Saint Denis, Bishop and Martyr, and his Companions, Martyrs or Optional Memorial of Saint John Leonardi, Priest Gospel: Luke 11:15 26
Today is Friday of the Twenty-seventh Week in Ordinary Time. Today the Church celebrates the Optional Memorials of three saints. The recently published Roman Missal tells us:
Saint John Henry Newman (1801 1890) was born in London, baptized on 21 February 1801, and studied at Trinity College, Oxford. As a Fellow of Oriel College and Vicar of the University Church, Newman became a leading figure in the Oxford Movement within the Church of England. His search for truth led to his reception into the Catholic Church by Blessed Dominic Barberi at Littlemore on 9 October 1845. Newman subsequently established the Oratory of Saint Philip Neri in England and spent most of his Catholic life in Birmingham. After many trials and disappointments, Pope Leo XIII created him a Cardinal in 1879 in recognition of his theological work and personal witness. He died on 11 August 1890 and was canonized by Pope Francis on 13 October 2019. On 9 November 2025, the Dicastery for Divine Worship and the Discipline of the Sacraments added his memorial to the Roman Calendar, to be celebrated as an Optional Memorial.
Saint Dionysius (+ c.258) is venerated as the first Bishop of Paris and patron of France. He is said to have been sent to Gaul by Pope Fabian and to have been beheaded at Montmartre together with Rusticus, a priest, and Eleutherius, a deacon. Some writers wrongly identified him with Dionysius the Areopagite, mentioned in Acts 17:34, who was claimed as the author of a series of works of mystical theology actually written in the fifth century. The great Abbey of Saint Denis in Paris is the burial place of many Kings and Queens of France.
Saint John Leonardi (c. 1542 1609) was born near Lucca (Italy) and, after training as a pharmacist, was ordained a priest. This allowed him to bring to people the medicine of God, Jesus Christ. He founded the Clerks Regular of the Mother of God and also helped establish the College of Propaganda Fide in Rome, which trained missionaries. He died of influenza while ministering to the Roman populace. He was chosen as patron of pharmacists in 2006.
The Scripture passage taken from the Gospel of Saint Luke today tells us of the judgement of the Jews of Jesus’ time upon Him after He drove out a demon, and of Jesus’ response. Let us try to understand.
First, Luke tells us: When Jesus was driving out a demon, some of the crowd said, “He casts out demons by Beelzebul, the prince of demons.” Others, to test him, kept demanding from him a sign from heaven. (cf. Luke 11:15 16)
Today, when we come to church to attend Holy Mass, we often hear some people say: The reason we choose to believe in God and to come here to attend Mass is because we like to watch the priest perform tricks on the altar. Sometimes we also feel that priests are like tools, merely acting by the authority given them by Jesus Christ. At other times, like those who falsely accused Jesus, we demand that the words the priest speaks and the Sacred Word of God he proclaims provide evidence to prove that God truly exists.
Who is the Beelzebul mentioned by Luke? Beelzebul was an idol worshipped by the Philistines on the plain of Sharon; his temple was at Ekron. He was originally a god of healing and deliverance from plague. When some Jews did not receive graces from their God, they would secretly go to Ekron to ask Beelzebul for healing. Therefore, this is clearly a pagan deity; whoever follows the mindset of this false god is one who refuses to accept what Jesus teaches — the law of God’s world.
In the parable Jesus tells, we see the crucial words: “kingdom”, “kingdom of God”. We know that in Jesus’ time, the Jews longed for a powerful Jewish kingdom like that of King David. In that kingdom there would be God, priests, the Sanhedrin, Pharisees, Sadducees, and various political factions. In that nation, social conflicts between classes were acute; people struggled for their own interests and fought among themselves for power. They even wanted to replicate such social systems and state structures in what they thought was the kingdom of God. This is the secular logic followed by the Jews. The kingdom of God spoken of by Jesus — that is, the logic of God which He proclaims — is a world centered always on God. In the kingdom of God as He describes it, there are no longer any political parties or classes; there is only the God who loves mankind and those who are loved by God. We no longer quarrel for our own interests, because all of us, through the grace of Baptism in the Lord Jesus Christ and by the oil of joy given by the Holy Spirit, have been made children of God. They no longer seek to hold power in the kingdom of God as Jesus describes it, but only desire to praise God together in that kingdom.
However, entering the kingdom of heaven that Jesus speaks of is not easy, because our three enemies — the devil, the flesh, and the world — constantly make us weak. Even if we wish to enter the kingdom of heaven that Jesus speaks of, the temptations of the world and the weakness of the flesh render us utterly feeble, making us unable to resist the assaults of the devil. Therefore, we urgently need the help of the Word of God, because we know: wherever the Word of God and His Gospel reach, the devil and his agents can by no means stand firm but must inevitably flee.
On this Optional Memorial of Saint John Henry Newman, Priest, Saint Dionysius, Bishop, and Saint John Leonardi, Priest, let us with one accord offer our prayer to God:
Almighty ever-living God, who in the abundance of your kindness surpass the merits and the desires of those who entreat you, pour out your mercy upon us to pardon what conscience dreads and to give what prayer does not dare to ask. Through our Lord Jesus Christ, your Son, who lives and reigns with you in the unity of the Holy Spirit, God, for ever and ever
您必须登录才能发表评论。