Catholic Family Devotions

Understanding the Day

Season

Eastertide

Week

Week 2 of Eastertide

Rank

First-class feast

Low Sunday, called Dominica in Albis in the Octave of Easter, falls on the Sunday after Easter and belongs to the second week of Eastertide. Eastertide is the fifty-day season that celebrates the Resurrection of Christ, and each day in the Octave (the eight-day extension of Easter) continues that joyful focus. The title “Double of the I Class” indicates this celebration has very high liturgical importance: it takes precedence over most other observances, uses the principal prayers and readings of the day, and governs the family’s prayer life for that Sunday. Because it is within the Octave of Easter, liturgies and devotions will strongly reflect Easter themes—joy, renewal, and Christ’s presence—rather than Advent or Lent practices.

Daily Prayer

The Introit for this day has not yet been generated.

Weekly Prayer

Weekly prayer content will appear here once it is scheduled.

Weekly Formation

Commandment 1

The Ten Commandments

I am the Lord thy God. Thou shalt not have strange gods before Me.
The First Commandment requires the worship, faith, hope, and love owed to God alone. A strange god is not only an idol, but anything treated as more important than God or trusted in place of His providence.

Saint & Feast

Principal celebrationCalendar title

Low Sunday

A biography or feast reflection has not yet been prepared.

Commemoration

George

St. George, Martyr

Christian saint and martyr (died 303)

Born: 0275-00-00 · Kayseri
Died: 0303-04-23 · Nicomedia

Saint George, also George of Lydda, was an early Christian martyr who is venerated as a saint in Christianity. According to holy tradition, he was a soldier in the Roman army. Of Cappadocian Greek origin, he became a member of the Praetorian Guard for Roman emperor Diocletian, but was sentenced to death for refusing to recant his Christian faith. He became one of the most venerated saints, heroes, and megalomartyrs in Christianity, and he has been especially venerated as a military saint since the Crusades. He is respected by Christians, Druze, as well as some Muslims as a martyr of monotheistic faith.

Today in Church History

No Church history reflection has been prepared for this date yet.

Catechism

Catechism of the Catholic Church

The Catechism teaches that death ends our earthly pilgrimage, the time of grace and mercy in which we live according to God’s plan and decide our ultimate destiny. It encourages us to prepare for the hour of death through prayer, asking the saints, the Mother of God, and St. Joseph to intercede for us. Our hope rests in the resurrection: by death the soul is separated from the body, but at the last day God will raise us, reuniting soul and body in incorruptible life. Because Jesus freely suffered death and conquered it, he opened the possibility of salvation to all. For family prayer and reflection, these teachings help us remember both the seriousness of earthly life and the Christian hope of resurrection.

In the face of death, Christians who unite their death to Jesus can view it as a step toward him and an entrance into everlasting life. Death brings earthly life, the time for accepting or rejecting God’s grace in Christ, to an end. At the moment of death, each person receives eternal retribution in a particular judgment that refers his or her life to Christ, according to faith and works. Those who die in God’s grace and friendship and are perfectly purified live forever with Christ in heaven. Heaven is perfect communion of life and love with the Holy Trinity, the Virgin Mary, the angels, and all the blessed: the ultimate fulfillment of our deepest longings. There the blessed see God face to face in the beatific vision, rejoice in doing his will, and reign with Christ forever.

¶ 1017

"We believe in the true resurrection of this flesh that we now possess" (Council of Lyons II: DS 854). We sow a corruptible body in the tomb, but he raises up an incorruptible body, a "spiritual body" (cf 1 Cor 15:42-44).

Today's Mass Readings

Open the day's Sancta MissaDivinum Officium · Divino Afflatu - 1954View readings