A Reading from the Letter of Saint Paul to the Ephesians Eph 2:19-22
Brothers and sisters:You are no longer strangers and sojourners,but you are fellow citizens with the holy onesand members of the household of God, built upon the foundation of the Apostles and prophets,with Christ Jesus himself as the capstone.Through him the whole structure is held togetherand grows into a temple sacred in the Lord;in him you also are being built togetherinto a dwelling place of God in the Spirit.
REFLECTION
"members of the household of God, built upon the foundation of the Apostles and prophets,with Christ Jesus himself as the capstone"
We are citizens or members of the household of God. And unless we are gifted with greatness, we should expect to lead good, holy and average lives. As in any household, we learn to live with one another, learn from each other and eventually grow to love one another.
After praying all night long, Jesus chose his twelve Apostles amongst the disciples. And today we honor Simon the Zealot and St Jude also called Thaddaeus. Simon is the eleventh of the twelve Apostles. He is also known as Simon Cananaeus, Hebrew for "zeal". He had fervent affection for Jesus and preached the Gospel through Egypt, Africa and Libya. He was a tanner. He was crucified.
St Jude was the one who at the Last Supper asked Jesus why He had shown himself only to the disciples and not to the world. He is the patron saint of lost and desperate causes. He was the brother of James the Less. He worked mainly in Persia. He was either beaten to death, beheaded or hacked to death. Therefore he is pictured with an axe. Not to be confused with Judas Iscariot, the traitor. St Jude is the patron saint of lost or hopeless cases.
Jesus was slowly and deliberately building his church. He was to be the capstone (a stone placed at the top of the wall, marking a successful completion) and the Apostles were to be the foundation.
And we are to live as faithful disciples, following and bringing others to Jesus. In PAPA our first introduction was to understand the vocation, vision, mission, purpose and legacy of PAPA. We follow the path of the saints and the apostles:
Our Vocation is to choose life, life eternal; Our Vision is to seek to see priests on fire for Jesus and His Church, the Body and Bride of Christ; Our Mission is to go and make disciples of all nations; Our Purpose is to pray for priests and recruit all to pray for priests by any necessary means; and Our Legacy is to put a smile of Jesus into the life of anyone we meet.
St Teresa of Avila wrote it succinctly for her nuns in The Way of Perfection, 7, 8.
The habit of performing some conspicuously virtuous action through seeing it performed by another is one which very easily takes root. This is good advice: to not forget it.
We thank the saints and the apostles, especially today, Saints Simon the Zealot and St Jude Thaddeus for their examples for us to follow. Pray for their intercession.
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