Daily Bible Readings February 28 2009 Saturday After Ash Wednesday

February 28 2009 Saturday After Ash Wednesday
Saint of the Day – Blessed Daniel Brottier

About the sources used. The readings on this site are from the Haydock Bible according to the daily Lectionary readings for the American Roman Catholic Church. The Haydock Bible contains traditional Catholic commentary and is free from copyright. Due to verse numbering differences and pastoral deletions in the actual Lectionary, these readings may at times vary from the actual readings.

Official Readings of the Liturgy at – http://www.usccb.org/nab/readings/022809.shtml

Isaiah 58:9b-14
Douay-Rheims Challoner

If thou wilt take away the chain out of the midst of thee, and cease to stretch out the finger, and to speak that which profiteth not. When thou shalt pour out thy soul to the hungry, and shalt satisfy the afflicted soul, then shall thy light rise up in darkness, and thy darkness shall be as the noonday.

And the Lord will give thee rest continually, and will fill thy soul with brightness, and deliver thy bones, and thou shalt be like a watered garden, and like a fountain of water whose waters shall not fail. And the places that have been desolate for ages shall be built in thee: thou shalt raise up the foundation of generation and generation: and thou shalt be called the repairer of the fences, turning the paths into rest.

If thou turn away thy foot from the sabbath, from doing thy own will in my holy day, and call the sabbath delightful, and the holy of the Lord glorious, and glorify him, while thou dost not thy own ways, and thy own will is not found, to speak a word: Then shalt thou be delighted in the Lord, and I will lift thee up above the high places of the earth, and will feed thee with the inheritance of Jacob thy father. For the mouth of the Lord hath spoken it.

Responsorial Psalm 85:1-6 (Ps 86 NAB)
DR Challoner Text Only

Incline thy ear, O Lord, and hear me:
for I am needy and poor.
Preserve my soul, for I am holy:
save thy servant, O my God, that trusteth in thee.
Have mercy on me, O Lord,
for I have cried to thee all the day.
Give joy to the soul of thy servant,
for to thee, O Lord, I have lifted up my soul.
For thou, O Lord, art sweet and mild:
and plenteous in mercy to all that call upon thee.
Give ear, O Lord, to my prayer:
and attend to the voice of my petition.

The Holy Gospel of Jesus Christ According to Saint Luke 5:27-32
Haydock New Testament

And after these things he went forth, and saw a publican, named Levi, sitting at the custom-house, and he said to him:

Follow me.

And leaving all things, he rose up, and followed him. And Levi made him a great feast in his own house: and there was a great company of publicans, and of others, that were at table with them. But the Pharisees and Scribes murmured, saying to his disciples:

Why do the disciples of John fast often, and make prayers, and the disciples of the Pharisees in like manner: but thine eat and drink?

And Jesus answering, said to them:

They who are in health need not the physician: but they that are sick. I came not to call the just, but sinners, to penance.

Haydock Commentary Isaias 58:9b-14
Notes Copied From Haydock Commentary Site

• Ver. 9. Finger, contemptuously, or threatening. S. Jer. — Some explain it of the ordaining sacred ministers, or taking another’s property.
• Ver. 10. Soul, effectually, and with love relieving the distressed. C.
• Ver. 11. Fail. Sept. Alex. adds, “and thy bones as a flower shall spring and grow fat, and shall inherit ages of ages.” S. Jerom says this is not in the best copies. H.
• Ver. 12. Generation. As the Jews did not comply with the condition, the Church falls heir to these promises.
• Ver. 13. Sabbath, doing no work, or refraining from the violation of festivals. — Delightful. We must not think the sabbath of the Lord a loss: (Amos viii. 5.) but rejoice in praising him. Ps. xlv. 11. C. — A word, or to apply to God’s word. Grot. — Pious reading on holidays is the duty of all who have an opportunity. H.
• Ver. 14. Earth. Judea. C. — Sept. “upon the good things of the land.” H.

Haydock Commentary Luke 5:27-32

• Ver. 28. The profane Julian charge S. Matthew with levity, in leaving all and following a stranger at one word. But hereby is seen the marvellous efficacy of Christ’s word and internal working, which in a moment can alter the heart of man, and cause him to despise what before was most near and dear to him. And this was done not only whilst Christ was living on earth, but daily in his Church. Thus S. Anthony, S. Francis, and others, hearing this word in the Church, forsook all and followed Jesus. S. Jer. in Matt. ix. S. Athan. in vita. S. Anton. August. Confess. l. viii. c. 11. Bonav. in vit. S. Francisci.
• Ver. 29. And Levi made him a great feast, to testify his gratitude to Jesus for the favour he had done him. It appears that both S. Mark and S. Luke affect, through consideration for S. Matthew, to designate him here by his less known name of Levi; whereas he designates himself, through humility, in this same circumstance, by his more known appellation of Matthew. See Matt. ix. 9. V.
• Ver. 31. Jesus Christ gives them here to understand, that they were of the number of those who languished under a severe indisposition, and that he was come to act as their Physician. S. Chrysos. hom. xxxi. in Matt.

Catena Aurea Luke 5:27-32
From Catechetics Online

• AUG. After the healing of the sick of the palsy, St. Luke goes on to mention the conversion of a publican, saying, And after these things, he went forth, and saw a publican of the name of Levi, sitting at the receipt of custom. This is Matthew, also called Levi.
• THEOPHYL; Now Luke and Mark, for the honor of the Evangelist, are silent as to his common name, but Matthew is the first to accuse himself, and gives the name of Matthew and publican, that no one might despair of salvation because of the enormity of his sins, when he himself was changed from a publican to an Apostle.
• CYRIL; For Levi had been a publican, a rapacious man, of unbridled desires after vain things, a lover of other men’s goods, for this is the character of the publican, but snatched from the very worship of malice by Christ’s call. Hence it follows, And he said to him, Follow me. He bids him follow Him, not with bodily step, but with the soul’s affections. Matthew therefore, being called by the Word, left his own, who was wont to seize the things of others, as it follows, And having left all, he rose, and followed him.
• CHRYS. Here mark both the power of the caller, and the obedience of him that was called. For he neither resisted nor wavered, but forthwith obeyed; and like the fishermen, he did not even wish to go into his own house that he might tell it to his friends.
• BASIL; He not only gave up the profits of the customs, but also despised the dangers which might occur to himself and his family from leaving the accounts of the receipts uncompleted.
• THEOPHYL. And so from him that received toll from the passers by, Christ received toll, not money, but entire devotion to His company.
• CHRYS. But the Lord honored Levi, whom He had called, by immediately going to his feast. For this testified the greater confidence in him. Hence it follows, And Levi made him a great feast in his own house. Nor did He sit down to meat with him alone, but with many, as it follows, And there was a great company of Publicans and others that sat down with them. For the publicans came to Levi as to their colleague, and a man in the same line with themselves, and he too glorying in the presence of Christ, called them all together. For Christ displayed every sort of remedy, and not only by discoursing and displaying cures, or even by rebuking the envious, but also by eating with them, He corrected the faults of some, thereby giving us a lesson, that every time and occasion brings with it its own profit. But He shunned not the company of Publicans, for the sake of the advantage that might ensue, like a physician, who unless he touch the afflicted part cannot cure the disease.
• AMBROSE; For by His eating with sinners, He prevents not us also from going to a banquet with the Gentiles.
• CHRYS. But nevertheless the Lord was blamed by the Pharisees, who were envious, and wished to separate Christ and His disciples, as it follows, And the Pharisees murmured, saying, Why do you eat with Publicans, &c.
• AMBROSE; This was the voice of the Devil. This was the first word the Serpent uttered to Eve, Yea has God said, You shall not eat. So they diffuse the poison of their father.
• AUG. Now St. Luke seems to have related this somewhat different from the other Evangelists. For he does not say that to our Lord alone it was objected that He eat and drank with publicans and sinners, but to the disciples also, that the charge might be understood both of Him and them. But the reason that Matthew and Mark related the objection as made concerning Christ to His disciples, was, that seeing the disciples ate with publicans and sinners, it was the rather objected to their Master as Him whom they followed and imitated; the meaning therefore is the same, vet so much the better conveyed, as while still keeping to the truth, it differs in certain words.
• CHRYS. But our Lord c refutes all their charges, showing, that so far from its being a fault to mix with sinners, it is but a part of His merciful design, as it follows, And Jesus answering said to them, They that are whole need not a physician; in which He reminds them of their common infirmities, and shows them that they are of the number of the sick, but adds, He is the Physician.
• It follows, I came not to call the righteous, but sinners to repentance. As if He should say, So far am I from hating sinners, that for their sakes only I came, not that they should remain sinners, but be converted and become righteous.
• AUG. Hence He adds, to repentance, which serves well to explain the passage, that no one should suppose that sinners, because they are sinners, are loved by Christ, since that similitude of the sick plainly suggests what our Lord meant by calling sinners, as a Physician, the sick, in order that from iniquity as from sickness they should be saved.
• AMBROSE; But how does God love righteousness, and David has never seen the righteous man forsaken, if the righteous are excluded, the sinner called; unless you understand that at He meant by the righteous those who boast of the law, and seek not the grace of the Gospel. Now no one is justified by the law, but redeemed by grace. He therefore calls not those who call themselves righteous, for the claimers to righteousness are not called to grace. For if grace is from repentance, surely he who despises repentance renounces grace.
• AMBROSE; But He calls those sinners, who considering their guilt, and feeling that they cannot be justified by the law, submit themselves by repentance to the grace of Christ.
• CHRYS. Now He speaks of the righteous ironically, as when He says, Behold Adam is become as one of us. But that there was none righteous upon the earth St. Paul shows, saying, All have sinned, and need the grace of God.
• GREG. NYSS. Or, He means that the sound and righteous need no physician, i.e. the angels, but the corrupt and sinners, i. e. ourselves do; since we catch the disease of sin, which is not in heaven.
• THEOPHYL; Now by the election of Matthew is signified the faith of the Gentiles, who formerly gasped after worldly pleasures, but now refresh the body of Christ with zealous devotion.
• THEOPHYL. Or the publican is he who serves the prince of this world, and is debtor to the flesh, to which the glutton gives his food, the adulterer his pleasure, and another something else. But when the Lord saw him sitting at the receipt of custom, and not stirring himself to greater wickedness, He calls him that he might be snatched from the evil, and follow Jesus, and receive the Lord into the house of his soul.
• AMBROSE; But he who receives Christ into his inner chamber, is fed with the greatest delights of overflowing pleasures. The Lord therefore willingly enters, and reposes in his affection; but again the envy of the treacherous is kindled, and the form of their future punishment is prefigured; for while all the faithful are feasting in the kingdom of heaven, the faithless will be cast out hungry. Or, by this is denoted the envy of the Jews, who are afflicted at the salvation of the Gentiles.
• AMBROSE; At the same time also is shown the difference between those who are zealous for the law and those who are for grace, that they who follow the law shall suffer eternal hunger of soul, while they who have received the word into the inmost soul, refreshed with abundance of heavenly meat and drink, can neither hunger nor thirst. And so they who fasted in soul murmured.