Understanding the Day
Season
Time After Pentecost
Week
Week 13 of Time After Pentecost
Rank
Major feast
Introit (Daily Prayer)
I will speak of Your decrees before kings without being ashamed. And I will delight in Your commands, which I love exceedingly.
Ps 91:2
It is good to give thanks to the Lord, to sing to Your name, Most High.
Glory Be to the Father…
We who have been refreshed by the richness of Your divine sacrament beseech You, O Lord our God, that through the intercession of blessed N., Your Virgin and Martyr, we may forevermore abide in its participation.
Through our Lord…
Weekly Prayer
Come, Holy Spirit
and enkindle in them the fire of Thy love.
℣ Send forth Thy Spirit, and they shall be created.
℟ And Thou shalt renew the face of the earth.
Let us pray.
O God, Who didst instruct the hearts of the faithful by the light of the Holy Spirit, grant us in the same Spirit to be truly wise, and ever to rejoice in His consolation.
Through Christ our Lord. Amen.
Weekly Formation
The Corporal Works of Mercy
The Corporal Works of Mercy
Feed the hungry
Feeding the hungry supplies necessary nourishment to those who lack it. It is a corporal work because it serves a bodily need, and an act of mercy because charity responds to another’s misery rather than ignoring preventable want.
Give drink to the thirsty
Giving drink to the thirsty provides the water or other wholesome refreshment needed for life and health. The work includes direct aid and reasonable support for efforts that make safe water available to people in need.
Clothe the naked
Clothing the naked provides suitable clothing and protection to those who lack them. It safeguards bodily health and personal dignity while recognizing that unused or excess goods can answer another person’s genuine necessity.
Visit the imprisoned
Visiting the imprisoned brings humane presence and assistance to those deprived of liberty, including people unjustly confined or otherwise held captive. It neither approves wrongdoing nor abandons justice, but refuses to treat any prisoner as beyond dignity, truth, or mercy.
Shelter the homeless
Sheltering the homeless provides safe lodging or helps secure it for those without a stable place to live. Traditional language calls this harboring the harborless, extending hospitality and protection to the stranger and displaced person.
Visit the sick
Saint & Feast
Decollation of John the Baptist
Beheading of St. John the Baptist
Christian holy day and dedication
The beheading of John the Baptist, also known as the decollation of Saint John the Baptist or the beheading of the Forerunner, is a biblical event commemorated as a holy day by various Christian churches. According to the New Testament, Herod Antipas, ruler of Galilee under the Roman Empire, had imprisoned John the Baptist because he had publicly reproved Herod for divorcing his first wife and unlawfully taking his sister-in-law Herodias as his second wife. He then ordered him to be killed by beheading.
Learn more about Decollation of John the BaptistSabina
Today in Church History
Papal Succession: Pope Innocent VIII
1484PapalIn 1484, Pope Innocent VIII succeeded Pope Sixtus IV. His papacy is noted for its involvement in the later stages of the Spanish Inquisition and the consolidation of papal power.
Leadership transitions in the Church remind us of the continuity and guidance provided by the Holy Spirit.