今天教會慶祝羅馬的聖方濟各貞女的自由紀念瞻禮。聖人在於1384年出生於羅馬的一個富裕的貴族家庭。她在著名的納沃納廣場（Piazza Navona）的聖依搦斯蒙難堂（Chiesa di Sant’Agnese in Agone）領洗。聖人在11歲的時候想成為修女，可是，她的父母在她12歲的時候強迫她嫁給洛倫佐·龐齊亞尼（Lorenzo Ponziani），他是羅馬教宗軍隊的指控官，家境極其富裕。儘管這場婚姻是父母安排的，可是，在她婚後四十年以來，她過得幸福美滿。 羅馬教宗與西方天主教會大分裂期間，洛倫佐為教宗服務。據說：他們的兒子巴蒂斯塔（Battista）被作為人質送給了那不勒斯軍隊的指揮官。聖人遵從其神師的命令，將兒子帶到了坎皮多利奧（Campidoglio）。途中，她停在當地的阿拉科埃利教堂（Church of the Aracoeli），將兒子的生命託付給了聖母。當他們到達指定地點時，士兵們試圖將她的兒子放在馬上，以便將他押送至囚禁地。然而，儘管士兵們狠狠地抽打馬匹，它卻一動不動。士兵們認為這是天主的旨意，於是將男孩交還給了他的母親。 1425年8月15日，聖母升天節，她創立了奧利韋坦聖母獻身會（Olivetan Oblates of Mary），這是一個由虔誠女性組成的團體，隸屬于羅馬聖母新修道院（Abbey of Santa Maria Nova in Rome）的奧利韋坦修士管理之下，但她們既不隱修，也不受正式誓言的約束，因此她們可以遵循她的模式，將祈禱生活與滿足社會需求相結合。 約1650年 1433年3月，她在坎皮多利奧附近的托爾德斯佩基創立了一座修道院，以供那些自稱為“共濟會”成員的人過共同生活。這座修道院至今仍是該修會唯一的院所。同年7月4日，該團體獲教皇尤金四世批准，成為具有私人宗教誓言的獻身者修會。該團體後來簡稱為“羅馬聖方濟各獻身者”。 聖人在自己丈夫生命的最後七年裡，她一直照料著他在戰鬥中受傷的丈夫。當丈夫于1436年去世時，她搬進了修道院，並成為了院長。她於1440年去世，並被安葬在新聖母堂。 1608年5月9日，教宗保祿五世冊封她為聖人，1925年，教宗庇護十一世把她宣為汽車駕駛員的主保，因為有傳言說：她在出行的時候，有天使用燈照亮她的前路，使她遠離危險。在本篤會中，她也被尊為奉獻者的主保。聖人也是寡婦的主保聖人。
今天教会庆祝罗马的圣方济各贞女的自由纪念瞻礼。圣人在于1384年出生于罗马的一个富裕的贵族家庭。她在著名的纳沃纳广场（Piazza Navona）的圣依搦斯蒙难堂（Chiesa di Sant’Agnese in Agone）领洗。圣人在11岁的时候想成为修女，可是，她的父母在她12岁的时候强迫她嫁给洛伦佐·庞齐亚尼（Lorenzo Ponziani），他是罗马教宗军队的指控官，家境极其富裕。尽管这场婚姻是父母安排的，可是，在她婚后四十年以来，她过得幸福美满。 罗马教宗与西方天主教会大分裂期间，洛伦佐为教宗服务。据说：他们的儿子巴蒂斯塔（Battista）被作为人质送给了那不勒斯军队的指挥官。圣人遵从其神师的命令，将儿子带到了坎皮多利奥（Campidoglio）。途中，她停在当地的阿拉科埃利教堂（Church of the Aracoeli），将儿子的生命托付给了圣母。当他们到达指定地点时，士兵们试图将她的儿子放在马上，以便将他押送至囚禁地。然而，尽管士兵们狠狠地抽打马匹，它却一动不动。士兵们认为这是天主的旨意，于是将男孩交还给了他的母亲。 1425年8月15日，圣母升天节，她创立了奥利韦坦圣母献身会（Olivetan Oblates of Mary），这是一个由虔诚女性组成的团体，隶属于罗马圣母新修道院（Abbey of Santa Maria Nova in Rome）的奥利韦坦修士管理之下，但她们既不隐修，也不受正式誓言的约束，因此她们可以遵循她的模式，将祈祷生活与满足社会需求相结合。 约1650年 1433年3月，她在坎皮多利奥附近的托尔德斯佩基创立了一座修道院，以供那些自称为“共济会”成员的人过共同生活。这座修道院至今仍是该修会唯一的院所。同年7月4日，该团体获教皇尤金四世批准，成为具有私人宗教誓言的献身者修会。该团体后来简称为“罗马圣方济各献身者”。 圣人在自己丈夫生命的最后七年里，她一直照料着他在战斗中受伤的丈夫。当丈夫于1436年去世时，她搬进了修道院，并成为了院长。她于1440年去世，并被安葬在新圣母堂。 1608年5月9日，教宗保禄五世册封她为圣人，1925年，教宗庇护十一世把她宣为汽车驾驶员的主保，因为有传言说：她在出行的时候，有天使用灯照亮她的前路，使她远离危险。在本笃会中，她也被尊为奉献者的主保。圣人也是寡妇的主保圣人。
March 9, 2026 Monday of the Third Week of Lent Or Optional Memorial of Saint Frances of Rome, religious Gospel: Luke 4:24-30 The Unaccepted Prophet
Today the Church celebrates the Optional Memorial of St. Frances of Rome, Virgin. Born in 1384 into a wealthy aristocratic family in Rome, she was baptized in the Chiesa di Sant’Agnese in Agone (Church of St. Agnes in Agone) on the famous Piazza Navona. At age 11, she desired to become a nun, but at around 12, her parents forced her to marry Lorenzo Ponziani, commander of the Papal troops of Rome and a member of an extremely wealthy family. Though the marriage was arranged, it was blessed by God, and they lived happily together for forty years. During the Western Schism of the Catholic Church, when the Pope in Rome opposed various antipopes, Lorenzo served the former. It is said that their son Battista was to be handed over as a hostage to the commander of the Neapolitan troops. Obeying her spiritual director’s command, Frances took her son to the Campidoglio. Along the way, she stopped at the Church of the Aracoeli there and entrusted her son’s life to the Blessed Mother. Upon arriving at the designated site, the soldiers tried to place her son on a horse to transport him to captivity. However, despite heavy whipping, the horse refused to move. Seeing the hand of God in this, the soldiers returned the boy to his mother. On August 15, 1425 (Feast of the Assumption of Mary), she founded the Olivetan Oblates of Mary, a confraternity of pious women under the authority of the Olivetan monks of the Abbey of Santa Maria Nova in Rome. Neither cloistered nor bound by formal vows, they could follow her model of combining a life of prayer with meeting societal needs. In March 1433, she established a monastery at Tor de’ Specchi, near the Campidoglio, for those members of the confraternity who felt called to communal life. This monastery remains the only house of the institute. On July 4 that year, they received approval from Pope Eugene IV as a religious congregation of oblates with private vows. Later known simply as the Oblates of St. Frances of Rome, the community grew in devotion. Frances herself remained in her home, nursing her husband through the final seven years of his life—he had been severely wounded in battle. After his death in 1436, she entered the monastery and became its superior. She died in 1440 and was buried in Santa Maria Nova. On May 9, 1608, Pope Paul V canonized her as a saint. In 1925, Pope Pius XI declared her patroness of motorists, as tradition holds that an angel once lit her path with a lamp while she traveled, protecting her from danger. Among Benedictines, she is also venerated as patroness of oblates, and she is patroness of widows. Today’s Gospel from St. Luke portrays an unaccepted Jesus. We often categorize people based on our own biases, treating Jesus as the crowd in the Nazareth synagogue did. Thus, Jesus tells them, “No prophet is accepted in his own hometown” (Luke 4:24). The incident began when Jesus quoted Isaiah’s prophecy of the Messiah’s mission: “The Spirit of the Lord is upon me, because he has anointed me to bring good news to the poor. He has sent me to proclaim release to the captives and recovery of sight to the blind, to let the oppressed go free, to proclaim the year of the Lord’s favor” (Isaiah 61:1-2a; Luke 4:18-19). After reading this, Jesus declared, “Today this scripture has been fulfilled in your hearing” (Luke 4:21). But the Nazarenes, knowing Jesus since childhood, rejected his words as blasphemy. They drove him out of the synagogue, led him to a cliff, and intended to throw him down (Luke 4:28-29). Such conflict mirrors what happens within each of us. We often think we are pure after being washed clean of original sin in the mercy flowing from Christ’s pierced side on the Cross, and thus feel no need to listen to God’s Word proclaimed through His Church. When such thoughts arise, we, like the Nazareth crowd, reject all Jesus offers. Today, let us imitate St. Frances of Rome, Virgin: courageously renounce our selfish desires, embrace God’s Word, and faithfully proclaim it to the world.
May your unfailing compassion, O Lord, cleanse and protect your Church, and, since without you she cannot stand secure, may she be always governed by your grace. 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
March 8, 2026 Third Sunday of Lent Gospel: Jn 4:5-42 The Spring of Water that Gushes to Eternal Life
We often form fixed patterns of thought according to the common sense accumulated in our lives. Just like that Samaritan woman, when she came from the well her ancestors had left her, drawing the water needed for daily life from the well, she saw Jesus sitting by the well and, having no bucket, doubt arose in her heart (Jn 4:7-12). In her view, only the well called “Jacob’s Well” in earthly life was the sole source for her to live on earth. Our understanding of the grace God bestows upon us is no different. In our eyes, when we receive Christian Baptism, the holy water poured by the priest on our heads grants us eternal life; the flame taken from the Easter candle illuminates us; the white garment put on us by our godparents obtains forgiveness of sins and gives us new life. Whenever we understand the grace God bestows upon us in such a way, we are no different from that Samaritan woman who conversed with Jesus (Jn 4:13-20), because the Samaritan woman’s knowledge of God was based on human transmission; therefore, when Jesus revealed to her the spring of water that makes one never thirst again, she still adhered to human transmission and continued to worship God on Mount Gerizim known to her ancestors. As I write this reflection, I often think of a scene I witnessed during a pastoral visit to a parish. It was a parish with an elderly majority, who were extremely devout and attended Mass almost every day. After obtaining permission from the pastor, I had an exchange with them. I asked them: Do you know what the spring of eternal life is? They said: The baptismal font is that spring of eternal life. Then I asked them: Where does the water in this baptismal font come from? They said: Our pastor draws it from the tap. I thought, perhaps this is the Samaritan woman mentioned in the Gospel. Today, we receive Christ’s Baptism in the baptismal font, and the water used for Baptism originates from the Sacred Side of Jesus Christ. Just as humanity sinned through the rib of the first Adam, so through the rib of the second Adam, we are reconciled with God, and by God’s mercy, all our sins are completely washed away. As I mentioned in my reflection on the Gospel at the Mass of Divine Mercy Sunday in 2023: Each of us receives the same Baptism of Christ as those brothers and sisters who joined the Church by receiving Christ’s Baptism on the evening of Holy Saturday. In the Sacrament of Baptism, the water poured by the priest on our foreheads is the spring flowing from the Sacred Side of Jesus, pierced on the Cross out of love for us. We are thus cleansed of original sin in the fountain of His grace, and through the Baptism received, we are united with His death, die with Him, and are buried with Him, so that we may begin a new life in Him through resurrection similar to His (cf. Rom 6:1-10). Thus, we are reborn in the Sacred Side of Christ. Whenever we join with all brothers and sisters who have received the Sacraments of Baptism and Confirmation to participate in the Holy Eucharist, celebrated in memory of the Savior’s Passion, Holy Death, and Resurrection, in the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass, the merciful Christ continues to reveal to us the truth about the Kingdom of Heaven through His faithful servants. Today, I want to say: The merciful Christ reveals to us that the truth about the Kingdom of Heaven is a Kingdom full of fraternal love, where there are no authorities or rulers anymore, only the loving God and those loved by God. All are cleansed from Jesus Christ—the spring of living water that makes one never thirst again—and together receive the Most Holy Body of Our Lord Jesus Christ, which is the bread of angels that makes one never hungry again.
O God, author of every mercy and of all goodness, who in fasting, prayer and almsgiving have shown us a remedy for sin, look graciously on this confession of our lowliness, that we, who are bowed down by our conscience, may always be lifted up by your mercy. 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
March 7, 2026 Saturday of the Second Week of Lent Or Optional Memorial of Saints Perpetua and Felicity, Martyrs Gospel: Gospel: Luke 15:1-3, 11-32
Today is the Second Week of Lent, Saturday, and also the Optional Memorial of the martyrs St. Felicity and St. Perpetua. The hagiography tells us they were martyrs of the 3rd century A.D. St. Perpetua, a noblewoman of good education, was martyred at age 22 while nursing an infant son. St. Felicity, who was arrested alongside her, was pregnant at the time of her arrest. The early Church historian St. Eusebius of Caesarea informs us that these two martyrs gave their lives for the Lord around A.D. 203. Today’s Gospel from St. Luke recounts Jesus’ Parable of the Prodigal Son. This parable speaks profoundly to our present lives. We often witness in daily life children whose parents are still living requesting their share of the inheritance. Like the younger son in today’s parable (Luke 15:11-12), once they receive their portion, they squander it recklessly, heedless that all they possess will eventually be exhausted by their wastefulness. When faced with such destitution, they, like that younger son, forget their dignity and choose a degrading life to survive (cf. Luke 15:13-16). Only when they realize this cannot sustain them in the world do they understand how blessed they were to have parents who cared for them. As I write this reflection, I often think of a scene I witnessed in my parish: brothers and sisters whose consciences trouble them, who come to participate in Mass yet refuse to receive Holy Communion. They believe the Heavenly Father is just and will severely punish them for their sins. Thus, they dare not come before the throne of God to receive Jesus Christ in the Eucharist, nor even seek reconciliation with Him through the Sacrament of Reconciliation. I wish to take this opportunity to speak to those brothers and sisters who dare not come to parish Mass, dare not receive Holy Communion, or dare not approach the Sacrament of Reconciliation: In today’s Gospel, that compassionate father is our Heavenly Father. As St. John says, “For God so loved the world that He gave His only Son, so that everyone who believes in Him might not perish but might have eternal life. For God did not send His Son into the world to condemn the world, but that the world might be saved through Him” (John 3:16-17). He is not the harsh God described by the Pharisees, nor the God who loves sacrifices alone as the Sadducees claimed, but a Heavenly Father who actively loves us and actively forgives us. I also wish to address those brothers and sisters who regularly go to confession, and indeed all of you: After seeking reconciliation with the Heavenly Father through the Sacrament of Reconciliation, we must resolve to renounce sin, renounce the devil, renounce all his works and all the temptations he offers us, and live the spirit of the Gospel daily. Let us not be like the elder son in Jesus’ parable, who grew jealous of brothers and sisters sincerely seeking reconciliation with God and receiving His mercy (cf. Luke 15:25-30). Instead, let us sit together at the Eucharistic table, sharing the cup, so we may more abundantly share in the salvation Christ brings us.
O God, who grant us by glorious healing remedies while still on earth to be partakers of the things of heaven, guide us, we pray, through this present life and bring us to that light in which you dwell. 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. Amen.
全属于祢 
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