Many people go through life and don’t think much about saints. We see them as different from us, and we categorize them as holy people who were born different and have a sacredness unlike ourselves.
We consider sainthood as something not for us.
We are just ordinary people we tell ourselves.
We sin and have failed to stop sinning. So we don’t even consider it.
But reading the lives of saints will change your mind.
For many saints their lives were anything but holy. Many rejected the faith. Many lived hedonistic lifestyles.
But one day everything changed.
St Paul of course was visited by Jesus and he would grow in holiness. But others like St Augustine reasoned into living a holy life. Many times, the event was a singular event but other times the change slowly grew.
Today the fact is saints are just people who accepted the invitation to be the best they could be. To be who they were created to be. Holy. God focused. Well even saintly.
But you and I are called to sainthood too. All the baptized are called to holiness.
But we have yet to say yes to that calling. We have been blessed with many things including a call to sainthood. But have not responded.
Today let’s ask ourselves what our life would look like if we pursued holiness as much as we pursued profit. Or maybe spend as much time in prayer and meditation as we do on the Internet or our phones.
Holiness is our calling. Each of us called to be saints.
Jesus is waiting for us to say yes, truly yes, to our calling to be saints for him.
What is our answer?
August 14
Saint Maximilian Mary Kolbe, Priest and Martyr
Memorial
Today the Church honors St. Maximilian Kolbe; a Polish Franciscan priest, international publisher of Marian devotion and 20th century martyr. At age 13, he entered a Franciscan minor seminary, becoming ordained at age 24. He held doctorates in theology and philosophy. In 1917, he led a small group of Franciscans to Rome to stand against anti-Catholic demonstrations and formed an association called the Militia Immaculata (M.I.). When he returned to Poland, the M.I. started producing faith periodicals; eventually growing into a publishing house of 650 friars – the largest religious house in the world. With Marian devotion as a focus to Christ, the M.I. began a daily newspaper, a monthly magazine, a radio station, and planned a movie studio. His circulation reached over a million readers and a second location was established in Nagasaki, Japan. In 1941, St. Maximilian was arrested and placed in a Nazi death camp. Shortly after, he died at Auschwitz, from a lethal injection, when he bartered his own life for a man’s who had a family. St. Maximilian is the patron saint of journalists, families, and the chemically addicted. [1][2]
Written by Sarah Ciotti
[1] News Agency, Feast of St. Maximilian Kolbe, martyr of Auschwitz, to be celebrated August 14, 2010.
[2] “Who is St. Maximillan Kolbe?,” Militia of the Immaculata, http://www.consecration.com
Gospel
Some Pharisees approached Jesus, and tested him, saying,
“Is it lawful for a man to divorce his wife for any cause whatever?”
He said in reply, “Have you not read that from the beginning
the Creator made them male and female and said,
For this reason a man shall leave his father and mother
and be joined to his wife, and the two shall become one flesh?
So they are no longer two, but one flesh.
Therefore, what God has joined together, man must not separate.”
They said to him, “Then why did Moses command
that the man give the woman a bill of divorce and dismiss her?”
He said to them, “Because of the hardness of your hearts
Moses allowed you to divorce your wives,
but from the beginning it was not so.
I say to you, whoever divorces his wife
(unless the marriage is unlawful)
and marries another commits adultery.”
His disciples said to him,
“If that is the case of a man with his wife,
it is better not to marry.”
He answered, “Not all can accept this word,
but only those to whom that is granted.
Some are incapable of marriage because they were born so;
some, because they were made so by others;
some, because they have renounced marriage
for the sake of the Kingdom of heaven.
Whoever can accept this ought to accept it.”
Deacon Tony Pynes 
Leave a comment