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Pope Saint Martin I was born between 590 and 600. He died on September 16, 655. He is widely regarded as the last Papal martyr. He was actually arrested in Rome by the Byzantine Empire (some accounts say that he was actually taken into custody while sickly reclining on a couch in front of the altar in the Lateran Basilica in Rome (which was then part of the Papal States and the pope ruled Rome)(https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Archbasilica_of_Saint_John_Lateran). To date, he is the only pope taken into custody in the Basilica of Saint John Lateran (named for the Apostle and Evangelist). Image retrieved from https://www.jesuit.org.sg/shalom-easter-2nd-week-tuesday-13th-apr-2021/ and used as being ion the public domain. Pope Saint Martin I was born between 590 and 600 near Todi, Umbria in a place that is today named for him (Pian di San Martino - https://mapcarta.com/18687568). According to his biographer, Theodore, Pope Saint Martin I was of nobility and had an extreme intelligence. He was also extremely charitable to the poor. He may have been part of the Order of Saint Basil and may have been abbott of a monastery. Pope John IV sent the future pope in 641 to Dalmatia and Istria with vast sums of money t6o alleviate the sufferings of the poor in that region. His mission was also to win the release of captives taken by the Slavs during their invasion. Many of the churches were destroyed and the idea of rebuilding them was beyond consideration as the time. Accordingly, Pope Saint Martin I lovingly and carefully gathered all of the relics he could locate and brought them to Rome. In Rome, Pope John IV erected an oratory in their honor and top house the recovered relics. Pope Saint Martin I acted as a papal legate during the early period of the papacy of Pope Theodore I (his immediate predecessor). Pope Saint Martin I was but a deacon at the time of his election to the :Papacy. When Pope Saint Martin I was elected Pope in 649, Constantinople was the capital of the eastern Church. The Patriarch there was the most influential leader in the Church at the time. Without awaiting the approval or blessing of the Patriarch, Pope Saint Martin I had himself consecrated as the Bishop of Rome. After ascending to the papacy, one off the first official acts he undertook was to convene the Lateran Council off 649. Its primary purpose was to deal with the Monothelites, who had come up with the idea that, Jesus had only one will. It was condemned as a heresy. Pope Saint Martin I quickly penned down the holdings of the council into a papal encyclical. Emperor Constans responded by sending his armies into Italy. On June 17, 653, Pope Saint Martin I was arrested along with Saint Maximus the Confessor (feast day August 13) in the Basilica of Saint John Lateran. His captors quickly removed him from Rome, first to Naxos, Greece and then to Constantinople. He was saved from execution by Patriarch Paul II of Constantinople. The imperial Byzantine government forced the election of a new pope, much to the chagrin of Pope Saint Martin I. Pope Eugene I was elected in his stead. Pope Saint Martin I suffered a long and grueling imprisonment that included many indignities. He was finally exiled to Cherson (on the Crimean Peninsula) on May 15, 655, where he died the ensuing September 16. He was declared a saint prior to the Congregation for the Causes of the Saints. Pope Saint Martin I, pray for us! Please join me at 3:30 pm Eastern (US) time for the Chaplet of Divine Mercy, Saint of the Day and Daily Update. Please visit our friends, Tony and Paulette Rock at the Rock Company Shop. Websites I regularly mention in my broadcast include: Morning Offering (www.mortningoffering.com) and Catholic Online (www.catholic.org). Franciscan Media (Franciscanmedia.org) is another site that I peruse regularly. I love ewtn.com for its religious programming and often listen live on my computer. I love and depend on the English feed of the Eucharistic Miracles website published by Blessed Carlo Acutis (feast day October 12) at http://www.miracolieucaristici.org/en/Liste/list.html.I also play its television on my computer since EWTN is not carried on DirecTV Stream. Finally, I love the Guadalupe Radio Network and my Alabama feed!

I am certain that very few of us can speak in terms of how much we owe to a particular saint, especially one whose intercession we have never sought. But I owe a huge debt of gratitude to Saint Julie Billiart because she is the foundress of the Sisters of Notre Dame de Namur, thew order of sisters that taught me from kindergarten through eighth grade. She had an interesting life. Let's take a look at it, shall we? Image retrieved from https://www.catholicnewsagency.com/saint/st-julie-billiart-430 and used as being in the public domain. Saint Juliet Billiart was born on July 12, 1751 at Cuvilly, a village in Picardy, in northern France. She died April 8, 1816. She spent a significant portion off her life both bedridden and as a hunted lady. Her parents were Jean-François Billiart and Marie-Louise-Antoinette Debraine. They were known to be very strong Christians. As a result, Saint Julie knew the Catechism of thew Catholic by heart by the time she was seven. That was when Saint Julie began teaching the catechism to her friends. Apparently, she was quite the remarkable child and was very close to Christ even as a child. Saint Julie received her First Communion at the age of nine. This is remarkable because the standard age for receiving one's First Communion at that time was thirteen. She was also confirmed at the same time AND took a vow of perpetual virginity. THAT is a lot for a nine-year-old to handle. By comparison, I was eight when I received my First Communion in 1974. I was confirmed when I was 14 (and for both was taught by sisters from the Teaching Sisters of Notre Dame da Namur). Saint Julie was known for her embroidery work and her lace, which she sold in her family's store. When the family store was robbed, the family was never able to recover financially. As a result, Saint Julia found work as a farm worker. There, she taught songs, Bible verses and stories about saints to the other farm workers, all the while knowing that she wanted to enter religious life. In 1774, Julie witnessed the shooting of her father in the family store. This was a very traumatic experience for Saint, Julie, who was diagnosed with a "mysterious illness. This mysterious illness resulted in Saint Julie becoming bedridden for 22 years because of the trauma of an assassination attempt on the life of her father. Despite being bedridden, Saint Julie was known for her embroidery skills, he charitable works among the poor and her education of young girls without regard to whether they were from nobility or from the poor. She was known for spending four or more hours a day in contemplative prayer. In 1789, the French Revolution started. Saint Julie did her fighting from her bed. She would often allow priests to stay in her home in order to hide therm from the government. She refused to cooperate with priests loyal to the government. As a result, with the help of one of her students, escaped to Compiègne. She was so hunted that she had to hide under a mound of hay. While in Compiègne, Saint Julie received a second paralysis that left her unable to speak. It was in Compiègne that she was given the vision of a group of young lady and told that they would be her daughters to form a new religious order with. She moved to a small apartment in Amiens in October of 1794. It was there that she met the French nun (who was also of nobility), Françoise Blin de Bourdon. Saint Julie recognized Françoise as one of the ladies from her dream. The /Reign of ?Terror was in full force in 1797 when Saint Julie, de Bourdon, and the Abbé Thomas escaped from hiding to Bettencourt, an area in northern France for about six long years until they were able to return to Amiens in 1803. On February 2, 1804, Saint Julie together with de Bourdon, and another woman, Catherine Duchâtel made vows of chastity and dedication to the education and care of young girls. Thus, the Sister of Notre Dame were founded in Amiens, France. This group would eventually become the Sisters of Notre Dame de Namur. Above is the cross worn by the Sisters of Notre Dame de Namur. June 1, 1804 was the Feast of the Sacred Heart of Jesus. After praying a novena at the direction of her confessor, she was cured of her paralysis. This gave her the ability to travel. She made a journey to St. Valery-sur-Somme and Abbeville. Her efforts ended in success. Between 18014 and 1816, Saint Julie made more than 120 journeys, many of which were long and arduous. During this time, she founded 15 convents of sisters dedicated to the teaching of children. Saint Julie died on April 8, 1816 as she was praying the Magnificat. Saint Julie, pray for us! Please join me at 3:30 pm Eastern (US) time for the Chaplet of Divine Mercy, Saint of the Day and Daily Update. Please visit our friends, Tony and Paulette Rock at the Rock Company Shop. Websites I regularly mention in my broadcast include: Morning Offering (www.mortningoffering.com) and Catholic Online (www.catholic.org). Franciscan Media (Franciscanmedia.org) is another site that I peruse regularly. I love ewtn.com for its religious programming and often listen live on my computer. I also play its television on my computer since EWTN is not carried on DirecTV Stream. Finally, I love the Guadalupe Radio Network and my Alabama feed!

Let's start this story with the team in blue, in the center of your screen. They are the famed University of Connecticut (UCONN) Huskies of women's college basketball. For those not familiar with the sport, they are women's college basketball royalty. Winners of 11 national championships, they once won 111 consecutive games which is an all-time record in all of college sports. One of those 11 national championships was the 35-0 season in 1995 and Rebecca Lobo was a star on that team. Lobo went on to have a great career in the WNBA and was inducted into the women's basketball hall of fame. Lobo nows does color commentary on ESPN on women's basketball. UCONN is the greatest team of all-time but they were arguably going up against the best player of all time. That player is Caitlin Clark of the Iowa Hawkeyes. All Clark has done is virtually rewrite the NCAA record books, becoming the all-time college basketball leader (men's or women's) in both scoring and assists. This hasn't set well with many because Clark is a well-raised Catholic kid who doesn't buy into today's woke, narcissistic, hate America ideology. She's not an entitled brat and has gotten to where she is by hard work and dedication and good old fashioned values. Dawn Staley, the coach of the #1 ranked South Carolina Gamecocks has been one of her detractors. Staley recently stated that Clark can't be considered the greatest of all-time because she doesn't have a championship. Staley is also on record stating that transgenders should be allowed to compete in women's sports. There is a position that angers most Americans including me. Staley (left) has coached her team to a 37-0 record and a spot in the national championship game where they will face- you guessed it- Caitlin Clark and the Iowa Hawkeyes. The controversy is how Clark got there. While Staley's team dismantled their semi-final opponent, Clark's game came down to this play against those legendary Huskies of UCONN. This started off a bizarre media firestorm of people claiming Connecticut was robbed. Among those chiming in was non other than NBA great Lebron James. The problem with their protesting is that the preview photo above, and the replays, clearly show it was a foul. It is a shame that enemies of family values want to create a narrative that Caitlin Clark will play for a national championship only because of a 'bad call'. This is especially true because it wasn't a bad call! This is where former UCONN star Rebecca Lobo showed her integrity by saying the following: “Of course it’s tough to see, right, in the moment,” Lobo said Saturday on SportsCenter. “And at an end of a game, you want to see players with a missed shot or a made shot or a defensive stop deciding the game. When you watch the play back, it 100% was a foul. Aaliyah Edwards, not only with the wide base, she was moving. She hits Gabbie Marshall in a way that she can’t recover defensively. “It’s unfortunate that this game came down to an off-the-ball foul call, but if you had that foul call at any other point in the game, you wouldn’t give it a second thought. You would not question it at all. I understand why people are because of the timing of it, but Jay, this 100% – by the rules of basketball – is an illegal screen. It’s a foul.” South Carolina has won 37 straight games and they seem invincible going into today's game. That is until you remember that their last loss was to Caitlin Clark and Iowa. I make no secret about who I am rooting for.

Saint William of Eskilsoe is known by a few different names: William of Æbelholt; Vilhelm of Æbelholt; William of Eskilsø; and William of Paris. Saint William was born around the year 1125 at Paris in the Kingdom of France, and died on Easter Sunday, 1203 (April 6, 1203). He was born to a wealthy and prominent Franch family and was educated by his uncle, Hugh whop was the forty-second Abbott of Saint-Germain-des-Prés. He led an interesting life in his 78 years. Join me as we take a brief glance into the life of Saint William of Eskilsoe. Image retrieved from https://www.pinterest.com/pin/a-5minute-outreach-saint-william-of-eskilsoe--293930313179885203/ and used as being in the public domain . After his educated and his ordination to the diaconate, Saint William was awarded a position as a prebend of the Cathedral at the Abbey of Saint Genevieve. A prebend is a type of Canon with an administrative role in a cathedral or collegiate church. Saint William reportedly sought admission into a stricter house - either Cluniac or Cistercian - but ultimately decided to stay put. His austere life did not earn him any favors among his fellow Canons, who sought to prevent him from being ordained into the diaconate - even by means of slander to keep him from being ordained to the diaconate by the Archbishop of Paris. Instead, Saint William would have to be ordained by the Bishop of Senlis. Pope Eugene III ordered, in 1148, the the secular canons of Ste-Geneviève were replaced by canons regular from the Parisian Monastery of Saint Victor. Saint William joined the new order, though he often butted heads with his abbott, who subjected him too humiliating disciplines. In the year 1161, Absolon, the Bishop of Roskilde, sent Saxo Grammaticus from Denmark to Paris to retrieve canons regular for the reform of the canonry at Saint Thomas at Eskilsø. It is said that Absolon and Saint William formed a close friendship. Saint William did successfully reform that \astery and transferred too Æbelholt in 1176. As the Abbott at Æbelholt, Saint William worked hard to bring t]forth the change resulting from new standards of religious disciplines. Among these new religious disciplines was a stricter insistence on claustration - that is, the great insistence on religious being cloistered within the monastery. Saint William also worked to establish and maintain links between Denmark's religious institutions that had similar inclinations to ecclesiastical rigor. In the years 1183, the monastery at Æbelholt had 25 monks. It also served as a hostel for pilgrims, and did not charge for staying or eating there. Saint William died on Easter Sunday 1203, which was April 6 of that year. Saint William was canonized by Pope Homnorius III on January 21, 1224. Saint William, pray for us! Please join me at 3:30 pm Eastern (US) time for the Chaplet of Divine Mercy, Saint of the Day and Daily Update. Please visit our friends, Tony and Paulette Rock at the Rock Company Shop. Websites I regularly mention in my broadcast include: Morning Offering (www.mortningoffering.com) and Catholic Online (www.catholic.org). Franciscan Media (Franciscanmedia.org) is another site that I peruse regularly. I love ewtn.com for its religious programming and often listen live on my computer. I also play its television on my computer since EWTN is not carried on DirecTV Stream. Finally, I love the Guadalupe Radio Network and my Alabama feed!

This morning, going through my scroll, I was confronted with the picture you now see. It was posted by my good friend William Hemsworth who we affectionately refer to as Sir William of Hemsworth. The picture is of the Garden of Gethsemane. The first thing that struck me is the realization that my trip is paid off and, barring any unforeseen events, I will enter it myself some 7 1/2 months from now. The second thing that struck me is the contemplation of what those 2,000 year old trees would say if they could talk. "We stood here", they might recall, "while the ground in which we are rooted drank up the droplets of sweated blood that fell from the eternity". My guess is they would stand there silent today, even if they could speak. In the soft wind, the echoes softly dying. "Father, if it be possible, take this cup" and "Can you not watch with me one hour?" and, finally, "Would you betray your master with a kiss?". Roughly 33 and a quarter years before, a tranquil silence enveloped the world as a star illuminated the night sky in Bethlehem. The world waited transfixed as the eternity Himself prepared to animate human flesh. Now that body lies dead in a tomb as the starting tones of a coming symphony begin to rise. That body is to be brought to life again but this time with a burst of light and power such as earth has never seen- nor will again. but now we wait. A solemn, holy, reverent wait. All the treasure in the world lies perfectly still in a tomb. We stand mesmerized, clutching a candle.

The Seven Last Words, by Venerable Fulton John Sheen Image of Venerable Fulton J. Sheen retrieved from https://catholicsaints.info/blessed-fulton-john-sheen/ and used as being in the public domain. Dedication Compassionate Queen of the Seven Swords inHearts where Christ thy Son is KingI give thee seven wordsLovingly accept for what is best in themDropped from a Cross and the lips of God. Introduction Three elements conspire in the making of every great message: a pulpit, an audience and a truth. These three were present in the two most notable messages in the life of Our Blessed Saviour, the first and the last which He delivered to mankind. The pulpit of His first message was the mountain side; His audience, unlettered Galileans; His truth, the Beatitudes. The pulpit of His last message was the Cross; the audience: saints and sinners; the sermon was the Seven Last Words. In the four thousand years of Jewish history, the dying words of only three are recorded: Israel, Moses and Stephen. In His goodness, Our Blessed Lord has left us His thoughts on dying, for He more than Israel, more than Moses, more than Stephen is representative in all humanity. In this sublime hour, therefore, He calls all His children to the pulpit of the Cross, and every word He says to them is set down for the purpose of an eternal publication and an undying consolation. There was never a preacher like the dying Christ. There was never a congregation like that which gathered about the pulpit of the Cross. There was never a sermon like the Seven Last Words. Image retrieved from https://casandrawglori.pages.dev/zwqwmj-easter-2024-dates-good-friday-date-ncrktwsmr-photos/ and used as being in the public domain. The First Word Father, forgive them for they know not what they do! It seems to be a fact of human psychology that when death approaches, the human heart speaks its words of love to those whom it holds closest and dearest. There is no reason to suspect that it is otherwise in the case of the Heart of hearts. If He spoke in a graduated order to those whom He loved most, then we may expect to find in His first three words the order of His love and affection. His first words went out to enemies: "Father, forgive them"; His second to sinners: "This day thou shalt be with Me in Paradise"; and His third to saints "Woman, behold thy son." Enemies, sinners and saints - such is the order of Divine Love and Thoughtfulness. The congregation anxiously awaited His first word. The executioners expected Him to cry, for every one pinned on the gibbet of the Cross had done it before Him. Seneca tells us that those who were crucified cursed the day of their birth, the executioners, their mothers, and even spat on those who looked upon them. Hence the executioners expected a cry but not the kind of cry that they heard. Like some fragrant trees which bathe in perfume the very axe which gnashes them, the great Heart on the Tree of Love poured out from Its depths something less a cry than a prayer, the soft, sweet, low prayer of pardon and forgiveness: "Father, forgive them, for they know not what they do." Forgive whom? Forgive enemies? The soldier in the court room of Caiphas who struck Him with a mailed fist; Pilate, the politician, who condemned a God to retain the friendship of Caesar; Herod, who robed Wisdom in the garment of a fool; the soldiers who swung the King of Kings on a tree between heaven and earth - forgive them? Forgive them, why? Because they know what they do? No, because they know not what they do. If they knew what they were doing and still went on doing it; if they knew what a terrible crime they were committing by sentencing Life to death; if they knew what a perversion of justice it was to choose Barabbas to Christ; if they knew what cruelty it was to take the feet that trod everlasting hills and pinion them to a limb of a tree; if they knew what they were doing and still went on doing it, unmindful of the fact that the very blood which they shed was capable of redeeming them, they would never be saved! Why, they would be damned if it were not for the fact that they were ignorant of the terrible thing they did when they crucified Christ! It was only the ignorance of their great sin that brought them within the pale of the hearing of that cry from the Cross. It is not wisdom that saves: it is ignorance! If we knew what a terrible thing sin was and went on sinning; if we knew how much love there was in the Incarnation and still refused to nourish ourselves with the Bread of Life; if we knew how much sacrificial love there was in the Sacrifice of the Cross and still refused to fill the chalice of our heart with that love; if we knew how much mercy there was in the Sacrament of Penance, and still refused to bend a humble knee to a hand that had the power to loose both in heaven and on earth; if we knew how much life there was in the Eucharist and still refused to take of the Bread which makes life everlasting and still refused to drink of that Wine that produces and enriches virgins; if we knew of all the truth there is in the Church as the Mystical Body of 8 the seven last words Christ and still, like other Pilates, turned our backs to it; if we knew all these things and still stayed away from Christ and His Church, we would be lost! It is not wisdom that saves; it is ignorance! It is only our ignorance of how good God is that excuses us from not being saints! Prayer Dear Jesus, I do not want to know the wisdom of the world; I do not want to know on whose anvil snowflakes are hammered, or the hiding place of darkness, or from whose womb came the ice, or why the gold falls to the earth, earthly, and fire climbs to the heavens, heavenly; I do not want to know literature and science, nor the four dimensional universe in which we live; I do not want to know the length of the universe in terms of light years; I do not want to know the breadth of the earth as it dances about the chariot of the sun; I do not want to know the heights of the stars, chaste candles of the night; I do not want to know the depth of the sea, nor the secrets of its watery palace. I want to be ignorant of all these things. I want only to know the length, the breadth, and the height and the depth of Thy redeeming Love on the Cross, Sweet Saviour of Men. I want to be ignorant of everything in the world - everything but You, dear Jesus. And then, by the strangest of strange paradoxes, I shall be wise! The Second Word This day thou shalt be with Me in Paradise. There is a legend to the effect that when, to escape the wrath of Herod, Saint Joseph and the Blessed Virgin were fleeing into Egypt with the Divine Child, they stopped at a desert inn. The Blessed Mother asked the lady of the inn for water in which to bathe the Babe. The lady then asked if she might not bathe her own child, who was suffering with leprosy, in the same waters in which the Divine Child had been immersed. Immediately upon touching those waters baptized with the Divine Presence, the child became whole. Her child advanced in age and grew to be a thief. He is Dismas, now hanging on the Cross at the right hand of Christ! Whether the memory of the story his mother told him now came back to the thief and made him look kindly on Christ, we know not. At any rate, enough dry fuel of the right kind gathered on the altar of his soul, and now a spark from the central Cross falls upon it, creating in it a glorious illumination of faith. He sees a Cross and adores a throne; he sees a condemned Man, and invokes a King: "Lord, remember me when Thou shalt come into Thy Kingdom." Our Blessed Lord was owned at last! Amidst the clamor of the raving crowd and the dismal universal hiss of sin, in all that delirium of man's revolt against God, no voice was lifted in praise and recognition except the voice of a man condemned. If Peter, James, or John had cried out perhaps the friends would have rallied; perhaps the Scribes and Pharisees would have believed. But at that moment when death was upon Him, when defeat stared Him in the face, the only one outside the Small group at the foot of the Cross to acknowledge Him as Lord of a Kingdom, as the Captain of Souls, was a thief at the right hand of Christ. At the very moment when the testimony of a thief was given, Our Blessed Lord was winning a greater victory than any life can win and was exerting a greater energy than that which harnesses waterfalls; He was losing His life and saving a soul. And on that day when Herod and his whole court could not make Him speak, nor all the power of Jerusalem make Him step down from the Cross, He turns to a quivering life beside Him, speaks, and saves a thief: "This day thou shalt be with Me in Paradise." No one before was ever the object of such a promise, not even Moses, nor John, not even Magdalen, nor Mary! It was the thief's last prayer, perhaps also his first. He knocked once, sought once, asked once, dared everything and found everything. When our spirits stand with John on Patmos, we can see the whitestoled army in Heaven riding after the conquering Christ; when we stand with Luke on Calvary, we see the one who rode first in that procession, Christ, Who was poor, died rich. His hands were nailed to a Cross and yet He unlocked the keys of Paradise and won a soul. His escort into Heaven was a thief. May we not say that the thief died a thief, for he stole Paradise? Oh, what greater assurance is there in all the world of the mercy of God? Lost sheep, prodigal sons, broken Magdalens penitent Peters, forgiven thieves! Such is the rosary of Divine forgiveness. Prayer Dear Jesus! Your kindness to the penitent thief recalls the prophetic words of the Old Testament, "If your sins be as scarlet, they shall be made as white as snow: and if they be as red as crimson, they shall be white as wool." In your words of forgiveness to the penitent thief, I understand now the meaning of your words, "I am not come to call the just, but sinners. . . They that are in health need not a physician, but they that are ill." "There shall be joy in Heaven upon one sinner that doth penance, more than upon ninety-nine just who need not penance." I see now why Peter was not made Thy first vicar on earth until after he had fallen three times, in order that the Church of which he was the head might forever understand forgiveness and pardon. Jesus, I begin to see that if I had never sinned, I never could call You "Saviour." The thief is not the only sinner. Here am I! But Thou art the only Saviour. The Third Word Woman, behold thy Son. An angel of light went out from the great white throne of Light and descended over the plains of Esdraelon, past the daughters of the great kingdoms and empires and came to a humble virgin of Nazareth, knelt in prayer, and said: "Hail, full of grace!" These were not words: they were the Word. "And the Word became flesh." This was the first Annunciation. Nine months passed and once more an angel from that great white throne of Light came down to shepherds on Judean hills, teaching them the joy of a "Gloria in excelsis," and bidding them worship Him Whom the world could not contain, a Babe wrapped in swaddling clothes and laid in a manger. Eternity became time, Divinity incarnate, God a man, Omnipotence was discovered in bonds. In the language of St. Luke, Mary "brought forth her first-born Son and laid Him in a manger." This was the first Nativity. Nazareth passed into Calvary, and the nails of the shop into the nails of human malignity. From the Cross He completes His last will and testament. He had already committed His blood to the Church, His garments to His enemies, a thief to Paradise, and would soon commend His body to the grave and His soul to His Heavenly Father. To whom, then, could He give the two treasures, whom He loved above all others, Mary and John? He would bequeath them to one another, giving at once a son to His Mother and a Mother to His friend. "Woman!" It was the second Annunciation! "Behold thy son!" It was the second Nativity! Mary had brought forth her First-born without labor in the cave of Bethlehem; she now brings forth her second-born, John, in the labors of the Cross. At this moment Mary is undergoing the pains of childbirth, not only for her second born, who is John, but also for the millions who will be born to her in Christian ages as "Children of Mary." Now we can understand why Christ was called "her First-born." It was not because she was to have other children by the blood of flesh, but because she was to have other children by the blood of her heart. Truly, indeed, the Divine condemnation against Eve is now renewed against the new Eve, Mary, for she is bringing forth her children in sorrow. Mary, then, is not only the Mother of Our Lord and Saviour, Jesus Christ, but she is also our Mother, and this not by a title of courtesy, not by a legal fiction, not by a mere figure of speech, but by the right of bringing us forth in sorrow at the foot of the Cross. It was by weakness and disobedience at the foot of the tree of Good and Evil that Eve lost the title of the Mother of the Living; it is at the foot of the tree of the Cross that Mary by sacrifice and obedience regained for us the title of the Mother of Men. What a destiny to have the Mother of God as my Mother and Jesus as my Brother! Prayer O Mary! as Jesus was born to thee in thy first Nativity of the flesh, so we have been born of thee in thy second Nativity of the spirit. Thus thou didst beget us into a new world of spiritual relationship with God as our Father, Jesus as our Brother, and thou as our Mother! If a Mother can never forget the child of her womb, then, Mary, thou shalt never forget us. As thou wert Co-Redemptrix in the acquisition of the graces of eternal life, be thou also our Co-Mediatrix in their dispensation. Nothing is impossible for thee, because thou art the Mother of Him Who can do all things. If thy Son did not refuse thy request at the banquet of Cana, He will not refuse it at the celestial banquet where thou art crowned as Queen of Angels and Saints. Intercede, therefore, to thy Divine Son that He may change the waters of my weakness into the wine of thy strength. Mary, thou art the Refuge of Sinners! Pray for us now prostrate at the foot of the Cross. Holy Mary, Mother of God, pray for us sinners now and at the hour of our death. Amen. The Fourth Word My God! My God! Why hast thou forsaken Me? The first three words from the pulpit of the Cross were addressed to the three predilections of God: enemies, sinners and saints. The next two words, the fourth and the fifth, betray the sufferings of the God-man on the Cross. The fourth word symbolizes the sufferings of man abandoned by God; the fifth word the sufferings of God abandoned by man. When Our Blessed Lord spoke this fourth word from the Cross, darkness covered the earth. It is a common remark that nature is indifferent to our griefs. A nation may be dying of famine, yet the sun starts and plays upon the stricken fields. Brother may rise up against brother in a war which turns poppy fields into Haceldamas of blood, yet a bird, safe from the fire and shell, chants its little song of peace. Hearts may be broken by the loss of a friend, yet a rainbow leaps with joy across the heavens, making a terrible contrast between its smile and the agony it shines upon. But the sun refused to shine on the crucifixion! The light that rules the day, probably for the first and last time in history, was snuffed out like a candle when, according to every human calculation, it should have continued to shine. The reason was that the crowning crime of man, the killing of nature's Lord, could not pass without a protest from nature itself. If the soul of God were in darkness, so should be the sun which He had made. Truly, all was darkness! He had given up His Mother and His beloved disciple, and now God seemingly abandons Him. "Eli, Eli, 1amma sabactheni?" "My God! My God! Why hast Thou forsaken Me?" It is a cry in the mysterious language of Hebrew to express the tremendous mystery of a God "abandoned" by God. The Son calls His Father, God. What a contrast with a prayer He once taught: "Our Father, Who art in Heaven!" In some strange,, mysterious way His human nature seems separated from His Heavenly Father, and yet not separated, for otherwise how could He cry, "My God, My God?" But just as the sun's light and heat can be withdrawn from us by the intervening clouds, though the sun remains in the sky, so there was a kind of withdrawal of His Father's Face in the terrible moment in which He takes upon Himself the sins of the world.. This pain and desolation He suffered for each of us, that we might know what a terrible thing it is for human nature to be without God, to be deprived of a Divine Remedy and Consolation. It was the supreme act of atonement for those who abandon God, and those who doubt the presence of God. He atones first of all for atheists, for those who on that dark mid-day half believed in God, as even now at night they half believe in Him. He atoned also for those who know God, but live as if they had never heard His name; for those whose hearts are like waysides on which God's love falls only to be trampled by the world; for those who have had faith and lost it; for those who once were saints and now are sinners. It was the Divine Act of Redemption for all abandonment of God, for in that moment in which He was forgotten, He purchased for us the grace of never being forgotten by God. It was also the atonement for that other class who deny the presence of God, for all those Christians who abandon all effort when they cannot feel God near them, for all who identify being good with feeling good, for all those skeptics beginning with the first who asked, "Why has God commanded you?" - it was reparation for all the haunting questions of a doubting world: "Why is there evil?" . . . "Why does God not answer my prayers?" . . . "Why did God take away my mother?" . . . "why" . . . "why" . . . "why" . . . and the reparation for all those queries was made when God asked a "why" of God. Prayer Jesus, Thou art now atoning for those moments when we are neither hot nor cold, members neither of heaven nor of earth, for now Thou art suffering between the two: rejected by the one, abandoned by the other. Because Thou wouldst not give up sinful humanity, Thy Heavenly Father hid His Face from Thee. Because Thou wouldst not give up The Heavenly Father, sinful humanity turned its back to Thee. And thus in holy fellowship Thou didst unite us both. No longer can men say that God does not know what a heart suffers in abandonment, for now Thou art abandoned. No longer can men complain that God does not know the wounds of an inquiring heart which feels not the Divine Presence, for now that sweet Presence is seemingly hid from Thee. Jesus, now I understand pain, abandonment, and suffering, for I see that even the sun has its eclipse. But Jesus, why do I not learn? Teach me that just as Thou didst not make Thy own Cross, neither shall I make my own, but accept the one Thou makest for me. Tell me, how long, how long, O Lord, will I keep Thee writhing on the Cross? The Fifth Word I thirst. This is the shortest of the seven cries. Although it stands in our language as twro words, in the original it is one. At the moment when Our Saviour resumes His sermon, it is not a curse upon those who crucified Him, not a word of reproach to the timid disciples at the border of the crowd, not a cry of scorn to the Roman soldiers, not a word of hope to Magdalen, not a word of love to John, not a word of farewell to His own mother. It is not even to God at this moment! Out from the depths of the Sacred Heart there wells through parched lips one awful word "I thirst!" He, the God-Man, Who threw the stars in their orbits and spheres into space, Who "swung the earth a trinket at His wrist," from Whose finger tips tumbled planets and worlds, Who might have said that the sea is Mine and with it the streams in a thousand valleys and the cataracts in a thousand hills, now asks man - man, a piece of His own handiwork - to help Him. He asks man for a drink! Not a drink of earthly water - that is not what He meant - but a drink of love. I thirst for love! The last word was a revelation of the sufferings of a man without God; this word was a revelation of the sufferings of a God without man. Before it was man without God; now it is God without man. The Creator cannot live without the creature, the Shepherd without the sheep, the thirst of Christ's love without the soul-water of Christians. But what has He done to be entitled to my love? How much has God loved me? Oh! If I would know how much God has loved me, then let me sound the depths of meaning of that word "love," a word so often used and so little understood. Love, first of all means to give, and that is Creation. Love means to tell secrets to the one loved, and that is Revelation. Love means to suffer for the one loved, and that is Redemption. Love means also to become one with the one loved, not only in the unity of flesh but in the unity of spirit, and that is the Eucharist. Love wishes also to be eternally united with the one loved, and that is Heaven. Certainly, love has exhausted itself. There is nothing more that Christ could do for His vineyard than He has done. Having poured forth all the waters of His everlasting Love on our poor parched hearts, it is no wonder that He thirsts for Love. If love is reciprocal then certainly He has a right to our love. Yet, why do we not respond? Why do we let the Divine Heart die of the thirst for human hearts? With what justice He might complain: "Alack, thou knowest not How little worthy of any love thou art! Whom wilt thou find to love ignoble thee, Save Me, save only Me!"* Prayer Dear Jesus, Thou hast given all for me, and yet I give nothing in return. How often Thou hast come to gather vintage in the vineyard of my soul, and hast found only a few clusters! How often thou soughtest, and found nothing; knocked and the door of my soul was closed to Thee! How often Thou didst ask for a drink, and I gave Thee only vinegar and gall! How often, dear Jesus, I feared lest having Thee, I must have naught beside. I forget that if I had the flame, I would forget the spark; if I had the sun of Thy love, I could forget the candle of a human heart; if I had the perfect round of Thy happiness, I could forget the broken arc of earth. Oh, Jesus, my story is the sad story of a refusal to return heart for heart, love for love. Give me, above all human gifts, the sweet gift of sympathy for Thee. "Am I a stone and not a sheepThat I can stand, O Christ, beneath Thy CrossTo number drop by drop Thy Blood's slow loss,And yet not weep? "Yet give not o'er,But seek Thy sheep, true Shepherd of the flock,Greater than Moses, turn and look once moreAnd smite a rock." - Christina Rosetti The Sixth Word It is consummated. From all eternity God willed to make man to the image of His eternal Son. After having painted the heavens with blue and the earth with green, God then made a garden, beautiful, as only God knows how to make a garden beautiful, and in it placed man made to conform to the image of His Divine Son. In some mysterious way the revolt of Lucifer echoed to earth, and the image of God in man was blurred and ruined. The Heavenly Father in His Divine Mercy willed to restore man to his pristine glory. In order that the portrait might once more be true to the Original, God willed to send to earth His Divine Son according to whose image man was made, that the earth might see once more the manner of man God wanted us to be. In the accomplishment of this task, only Divine Omnipotence could use the elements of defeat as the elements of victory. In the divine economy of Redemption, the same three things which cooperated in our fall shared in our Redemption. For the disobedient man, Adam, there was the obedient man, Christ; for the proud woman, Eve, there was the humble virgin, Mary; for the tree of the garden, there was the tree of the Cross. The Redemption was now complete. The work which His Father had given Him to do was accomplished. We were bought and paid for. We were won in a battle fought not with five stones with which David slew Goliath, but with five wounds - hideous scars on hands and feet and side; in a battle fought not with armor glistening under a noon day sun, but with flesh hanging like purple rags under a darkened sky; in a battle where the cry was not "crush and kill," but "Father, forgive;" in a battle fought, not with spitting steel, but with dripping blood; in a battle in which he who slew the foe lost the day. Now the battle is over. For the last three hours He has been about His Father's business. The artist has put the last touch on his masterpiece and with the joy of the strong He utters the song of triumph: "It is finished." Yes, His work is finished, but is ours? It belongs to God to use that word, but not to us. The work of acquiring divine life for man is finished, but not the distribution. He has finished the task of filling the reservoir of Calvary's sacramental life, but the work of letting it flood our souls is not yet finished. He has finished the foundation; we must build upon it. He has finished the ark. opening His side with a spear and clothing Himself in the wardrobe of His precious blood, but we must enter the ark. He stands at vhe door and knocks, but the latch is on the inside, and only we can open it. He has enacted the consecration, but the communion depends upon us; and whether our work will ever be finished depends entirely on how we relive His life and become other Christs, for His Good Friday and His passion avail us nothing unless we relive it in our own lives. Prayer Dear Jesus, redemption is Thy work; atonement is mine, for atonement means at-one-ment with Thy life. Thy truth and Thy love. Thy work on the Cross is finished, but my work is to take you down. Thou hast been hanging there long enough! Through Thy Apostle, Paul, Thou hast told us that those who are Thine crucify their flesh and its concupiscences. My work, then, is not finished until I take Thy place upon the Cross, for unless there is a Good Friday in my life, there will never be an Easter Sunday; unless there is a garment of a fool, there will never be the white robes of wisdom; unless there is the crown of thorns, there will never be the glorified body; unless there is the battle, there will never be the victory; unless there is the thirst, there will hever be the Heavenly Refreshment unless there is the Cross, there will never be the empty tomb. Teach me, Jesus, to finish this task, for it is fitting that the sons of men should suffer and enter into their glory. The Seventh Word Father, into Thy hands I commend My Spirit. When Adam had been driven from the Garden of Paradise, and the penalty of labor imposed upon him, he went out in quest of the bread he was to earn by the sweat of his brow. In the course of that chase, he stumbled upon the limp form of his son, Abel, picked him up, carried him upon his shoulders, and laid him on the lap of Eve. They spoke to him, but Abel did not answer - he was never so silent before. They lifted his hand, but it fell back limp - it had never acted that way before. They looked into his eyes, cold, glassy, mysteriously elusive - they were never so irresponsive before. They wondered, and as they wondered, their wonder grew. Then they remarked: "For in what day soever thou shalt eat of the tree, thou shalt die the death." It was the first death in the world. Centuries whirled around into space, and the new Abel, Christ, is put to death by His jealous brethren of the race of Cain. The life that came out from the boundless deep now prepares to go back home again. His sixth word was a cry of retrospect: "I have finished the work." His seventh and last one is a word of prospect: "I commend My Spirit." The sixth word was manward; the seventh word was Godward. The sixth was a farewell to earth; the seventh His entrance into Heaven. Just as those great planets only after a long time complete their orbit and return again to their starting point, as if to salute Him Who sent them on their way, so too, He Who had come from Heaven had finished His work and completed His orbit, now goes back to the Father to salute Him Who sent Him out on the great work of the world's redemption. The Prodigal Son is returning to His Father's house, for is not Christ the Prodigal? Thirty-three years ago He left His Father's eternal mansion and went off into the foreign country of this world. Then He began spending Himself and being spent; dispensing with an infinite prodigality the divine riches of power and wisdom and bestowing with an heavenly liberality the divine gifts of pardon and mercy. In this last hour His whole substance is wasted among sinners, for He is giving the last drop of His precious blood for the redemption of the world. There is nothing to feed upon except the husks of human sneers and the vinegar and gall of bitter human ingratitude. He now prepares to take the road back again to His Father's house, and as yet some distance away He sees the face of His Heavenly Father and breaks out into the last and perfect prayer from the Pulpit of the Cross: "Father, into Thy hands I commend My Spirit." All the while Mary is standing at the foot of the Cross. In a short time the new Abel, slain by His brethren, will be taken down from the gibbet of salvation and laid in the lap of the new Eve. It will be the death of Death! But when the tragic moment comes it may seem to the tear-dimmed eyes of Mary that Bethlehem has come back. The thorn-crowned head which had nowhere to lay itself in death, except on the pillow of the Cross, may, through Mary's clouded vision, seem the head which she drew to her breast at Bethlehem. Those eyes at Whose fading even the sun and moon were darkened were to her the eyes that glanced up from a crib of straw. The helpless feet riveted with nails once more seem to her the baby feet at which were cast gold, frankincense and myrrh. The lips now parched and crimsoned with blood seem the ruddy lips that once at Bethlehem nourished themselves on the eucharist of her body. The hands that can hold nothing but a wound, seem once more the baby hands that were not quite long enough to touch the huge heads of the cattle. The embrace at the foot of the Cross seems the embrace at the side of the crib. In that sad hour of death which always makes one think of birth, Mary may feel that Bethlehem is returning again. Prayer No, Mary! Bethlehem is not come back. This is not the crib, but the Cross; not birth, but death; not the day of companionship with Shepherds and Kings, but the hour of a common death with thieves; not Bethlehem, but Calvary. Bethlehem is Jesus, as thou. His sinless mother, gave Him to man; Calvary is Jesus, as sinful man gave Him back to thee. Something intervened between Thy giving at the manger, and thy receiving at the Cross, and that which intervened is my sins. Mary, this is not thy hour; it is my hour - my hour of wickedness and sin. If I had not sinned, death would not now hover its black wings about His crimsoned body; if I had not been proud, the atoning crown of thorns would never have been woven; if I had been less rebellious in treading the broad way which leads to destruction, the feet never would have been dug with nails; if I had been more responsive to His shepherding calls from the thorns and thistles, His lips would have never been on fire; if I had been more faithful, His cheeks would never have been blistered with the kiss of Judas. Mary, it is I who stand between His birth and His approaching redemptive death! I warn thee, Mary, think not when thy arms come to clasp Him, that He is white as He came from the Father, but red as He came from me. In a few short seconds thy Son shall have surrendered His soul to His Heavenly Father, and His body to thy caressing hands. The last few drops of blood are falling from that great Chalice of Redemption, staining the wood of the Cross and crimsoning the rocks soon to be rent in horror - and a single drop of it would be sufficient to redeem ten thousand worlds. Mary, my mother, intercede to thy Divine Son for forgiveness of the sin of changing thy Bethlehem into Calvary. Beg Him, Mary, in these last remaining seconds the grace of never crucifying Him again nor piercing thy own heart with seven swords. Mary, plead to thy dying Son that as long as I live. . . Mary! Jesus is dead. . . . Mary! Taken from The Seven Last Words, by Venerable Fulton John Sheen, 1933, published by Our Sunday Visitor, Huntington, Indiana, Imprimatur of Bishop John Francis Noll, D.D., Diocese of Fort Wayne, Indiana Please join me at 3:30 pm Eastern (US) time for the Chaplet of Divine Mercy, Saint of the Day and Daily Update. I have nine beautiful prayer pamphlets that contain the Story of the Miraculous Medal and include a Miraculous Medal. I will give one each day from Today, Good Friday, through and including Mercy Sunday to the first person each day at 3:30 p.m. who calls 515-602-9655 and prays the Divine Mercy Novena with me. One winner per address. If you are a winner, find me on Facebook at https://www.facebook.com/kathleens.captain.crash to send me your address for your prize. You MUST pray with me live online to claim your prize. Starting on Good Friday, March 29, 2024, we will be praying the Divine Mercy Novena on the Chaplet of Divine Mercy show and will extend the show to one full hour for the nine days between Good Friday and Mercy Sunday (April 7, 2024). The prayers will come from here: https://www.thedivinemercy.org/message/devotions/novena Please visit our friends, Tony and Paulette Rock at the Rock Company Shop. I have received not one, but TWO orders from Tony and Paulette and have been thrilled with my purchases.  I'll never buy olive wood anything from anyone else ever again!  I'm even going to talk to my pastor about selling things from Tony and Paulette at the annual church olive wood materials sale. Websites I regularly mention in my broadcast include: Morning Offering (www.mortningoffering.com) and Catholic Online (www.catholic.org). Franciscan Media (Franciscanmedia.org) is another site that I peruse regularly. I love ewtn.com for its religious programming and often listen live on my computer. I also play its television on my computer since EWTN is not carried on DirecTV Stream. Finally, I love the Guadalupe Radio Network and my Alabama feed!

Lent ends at the beginning of the Mass of the Lord's Supper. That is when the Holy Triduum begins. The Triduum is the three days of the Passion of the Lord from His being taken at the Mount of Olives through His Crucifixion and into Holy Saturday. The Triduum ends last the beginning of the Easter Vigil Mass, usually on the evening of Holy Saturday. Holy Thursday is the commemoration of the Last Supper of Jesus Christ, when he established the sacrament of Holy Communion prior to his arrest and crucifixion. It also commemorates His institution of the priesthood. The holy day falls on the Thursday before Easter and is part of Holy Week. Jesus celebrated the dinner as a Passover feast. Christ would fulfill His role as the Christian victim of the Passover for all to be saved by His final sacrifice. The Last Supper was the final meal Jesus shared with his Disciples in Jerusalem. During the meal, Jesus predicts his betrayal. The central observance of Holy Thursday is the ritual reenactment of the Last Supper at Mass. This event is celebrated at every Mass, as party of the Liturgy of the Eucharist, but it is specially commemorated on Holy Thursday. He also establishes the special priesthood for his disciples, which is distinct from the "priesthood of all believers." Christ washed the feet of his Disciples, who would become the first priests. This establishment of the priesthood reenacted at Mass with the priest washing the feet of several parishioners. During the Passover meal, Jesus breaks bread and gives it to his Disciples, uttering the words, "This is my body, which is given for you." Subsequently, he passes a cup filled with wine. He then says, "This is my blood..." It is believed those who eat of Christ's flesh and blood shall have eternal life. During the Mass, Catholics rightly believe, as an article of faith, that the unleavened bread and wine are transformed into the body and blood of Jesus Christ through a process known as transubstantiation. There have been notable Eucharistic miracles attributed to this event, such as bleeding hosts (communion wafers). The Last Supper is celebrated daily in the Catholic Church as part of every Mass for it is through Christ's sacrifice that we have been saved. On the night of Holy Thursday, Eucharistic Adoration of the Blessed Sacrament takes place where the faithful remain in the presence of the Eucharist just as the Disciples kept a vigil with Christ. Following the Last Supper, the disciples went with Jesus to the Mount of Olives, where he would be betrayed by Judas. The Last Supper has been the subject of art for centuries, including the great masterpiece by Leonardo Da Vinci. The cup used by Jesus is known as the Holy Grail. Although it has been rumored to exist throughout history, it is almost certainly lost to time. There is no reason to believe the cup would have been outstanding in any way, and was likely a typical drinking vessel, indistinguishable from many others. Still, many myths continue to revolve around the artifact, and it remains a target for treasure seekers and a subject of entertainment. There is an incalculable abundance of art and tradition surrounding the Last Supper which has been celebrated by Christians since the last days of Christ until now. At every hour of every day, somewhere around the world, Mass is being said and Communion taken. This has been happening incessantly for at least several hundred years. For nearly the past two thousand years, not a single day has gone by without a Mass being celebrated in some fashion. Therefore, anyone who celebrates the Mass participates in a daily tradition that is essentially two thousand years old. During Lent, we should; live as children of the light, performing actions good, just and true - (see Ep 5:1-9). Nos autem gloriari oportet in cruce Domini nostri Iesu Christi, in quo est salus, vita et resurrectio nostra per quem salvati et liberati sumus. We should glory in the cross of our Lord Jesus Christ, for he is our salvation, our life and our resurrection; through Him we are saved and made free. (cf. Galations 6:14) Taken from https://www.catholic.org/lent/thurs.php. Please join me at 3:30 pm Eastern (US) time for the Chaplet of Divine Mercy, Saint of the Day and Daily Update. I have nine beautiful prayer pamphlets that contain the Story of the Miraculous Medal and include a Miraculous Medal. I will give one each day from Good Friday through and including Mercy Sunday to the first person each day at 3:30 p.m. who calls 515-602-9655 and prays the Divine Mercy Novena with me. One winner per address. If you are a winner, find me on Facebook at https://www.facebook.com/kathleens.captain.crash to send me your address for your prize. You MUST pray with me live online to claim your prize. Starting on Good Friday, March 29, 2024, we will be praying the Divine Mercy Novena on the Chaplet of Divine Mercy show and will extend the show to one full hour for the nine days between Good Friday and Mercy Sunday (April 7, 2024). The prayers will come from here: https://www.thedivinemercy.org/message/devotions/novena Please visit our friends, Tony and Paulette Rock at the Rock Company Shop. I have received not one, but TWO orders from Tony and Paulette and have been thrilled with my purchases.  I'll never buy olive wood anything from anyone else ever again!  I'm even going to talk to my pastor about selling things from Tony and Paulette at the annual church olive wood materials sale. Websites I regularly mention in my broadcast include: Morning Offering (www.mortningoffering.com) and Catholic Online (www.catholic.org). Franciscan Media (Franciscanmedia.org) is another site that I peruse regularly. I love ewtn.com for its religious programming and often listen live on my computer. I also play its television on my computer since EWTN is not carried on DirecTV Stream. Finally, I love the Guadalupe Radio Network and my Alabama feed!

Image retrieved from https://pastorjoyponders.blogspot.com/2017/04/spy-wednesday.html and used as being in the public domain. Judas Iscariot’s betrayal of Jesus is perplexing in several ways, and Christian thinkers have sought to make sense of it. The largest question is: Why did Judas perform the betrayal? What was his motive? The Gospels give us some clues. One is that Satan was working on Judas (Luke 22:3, John 13:2,27). However, this explains the action from a superhuman point of view and does not address why—on a human level—Judas would choose to betray Jesus. A possible human motive may have been greed. John indicates that Judas was greedy and had previously committed theft to obtain money (John 12:5-6), and Matthew portrays Judas as telling the chief priests, “‘What will you give me if I deliver him over to you?’ And they paid him thirty pieces of silver. And from that moment he sought an opportunity to betray him” (Matt. 26:15-16). Mark and Luke also mention a commitment to pay Judas (Mark 14:11, Luke 22:5). This suggests at least that Judas wanted to be compensated for the deed, but that doesn’t mean it was his primary motive. Why would someone who had followed Jesus for three years suddenly decide to betray his master? Is the opportunity for some quick cash really a sufficient motive? Many have thought that it is not, and they have proposed additional reasons. One is the idea that Judas was actually trying to help Jesus fulfill his messianic destiny by bringing him into contact with the Jewish authorities. This view would tend to rehabilitate Judas, as he thought he was doing a good thing. In favor of such a view, Judas could be seen as not aware of the fact he’s betraying Jesus, for when Jesus predicts at the Last Supper that one of the Twelve will betray him, Judas—along with the others—asks, “Is it I, Master?” (Matt. 26:25; cf. 26:22). Also, “when Judas, his betrayer, saw that Jesus was condemned, he changed his mind and brought back the thirty pieces of silver to the chief priests and the elders, saying, ‘I have sinned by betraying innocent blood’” (27:3-4). So maybe Judas just meant to put Jesus in contact with the chief priests and didn’t realize they would condemn him. Against this view is the fact that Judas “had given them a sign, saying, ‘The one I shall kiss is the man; seize him and lead him away safely’” (Mark 14:44). The use of a covert sign—as opposed to making a simple introduction—and the instruction to seize Jesus indicate consciousness of betrayal. However, another messianic motive is possible. No doubt, Judas—like the other disciples—expected Jesus to be a political Messiah who would kick out the Romans and restore national sovereignty to Israel (cf. John 6:15, 11:48-50; Acts 1:6). However, Jesus did not intend to be this type of Messiah. Perhaps Judas disagreed, and by forcing him into a confrontation with the chief priests, Judas was hoping to force him back onto what he regarded as the proper path for the Messiah—only to see Jesus condemned instead. Another possible motive is anger and resentment. It is clear from various passages in the New Testament that some disciples (Peter, James, John, and Andrew) were closer to Jesus than others, and Judas is always listed last among the Twelve (Matt. 10:1-4, Mark 3:13-19, Luke 6:12-16). Perhaps Judas’s lower status had come to grate on him after three years, and—under the influence of Satanically inspired envy and resentment—he decided to prove that he was a person of importance after all. What we can say with confidence is that on the superhuman level, Satan was involved, and on the human level, greed was involved, but beyond that, all we can do is speculate. Whatever Judas’s exact motive, a careful reading of the Gospels reveals that the betrayal involved an intricate, time-sensitive plan. “It was now two days before the Passover and the feast of Unleavened Bread. And the chief priests and the scribes were seeking how to arrest him by stealth, and kill him; for they said, ‘Not during the feast, lest there be a tumult of the people’” (Mark 14:1-2). Given the Jewish way of reckoning time, and that Passover began at sundown on Thursday, “two days before the Passover” points to sometime during the daytime on Wednesday. The Jewish authorities thus had a window of opportunity to arrest Jesus between Wednesday and Thursday. Beginning Friday morning, the feast of Unleavened Bread would be in full swing, and Jesus could be expected to be with the crowds during the daytime in the week-long festival. It apparently was on this Wednesday that Judas went to the chief priests and agreed to betray him, so he “sought an opportunity to betray him to them in the absence of the multitude” (Luke 22:6). Since Judas was now serving as their spy, the Wednesday of Holy Week is often called Spy Wednesday. Jesus being away from the crowds was important. Jesus noted that they could have arrested him any day they wanted as he taught in the temple (Matt. 26:55, Mark 14:49, Luke 22:53). By waiting until he was in a private setting, they could avoid the people rioting. Judas did not find an opportunity to betray Jesus Wednesday night or Thursday during the daytime, when Jesus was with the crowds. The next opportunity would be when he was alone with the disciples on Thursday night at the Passover meal, which would be in private. However, there was a new complication. Jesus kept the location of the Passover meal secret until the last moment, forcing the disciples to ask, “Where will you have us go and prepare for you to eat the Passover?” (Mark 14:16). Instead of simply telling them the location, Jesus sent two of the disciples (Luke reveals that it was Peter and John—Luke 22:8) to look for a man carrying a water jar—unusually, because carrying water was normally women’s work. They were then to follow this man back to a house, and there the householder would have a room prepared for them to eat the Passover meal (Mark 14:13-15). The apparent purpose of this subterfuge was to keep the Twelve—including Judas—from knowing the location of the meal until the last moment. That way, Judas could not bring the authorities there to arrest Jesus, for he greatly desired to eat this Passover with his disciples (Luke 22:15). At the Last Supper, Jesus announced that one of the Twelve would betray him, prompting the disciples to ask who it would be. Jesus indicated that it would be someone who dipped food in the same dish as him, which would make it obvious to anyone who was in the know that Judas would be the betrayer. But John’s Gospel indicates that this was a rather restricted audience. It may have been only Peter and the beloved disciple who knew. “One of his disciples, whom Jesus loved, was reclining at table at Jesus’ side, so Simon Peter motioned to him to ask Jesus of whom he was speaking. So that disciple, leaning back against Jesus, said to him, ‘Lord, who is it?’ Jesus answered, ‘It is he to whom I will give this morsel of bread when I have dipped it.’ So when he had dipped the morsel, he gave it to Judas, the son of Simon Iscariot. Then after he had taken the morsel, Satan entered into him. Jesus said to him, ‘What you are going to do, do quickly.’ Now no one at the table knew why he said this to him. Some thought that, because Judas had the moneybag, Jesus was telling him, ‘Buy what we need for the feast,’ or that he should give something to the poor” (John 13:23-29), since giving to the poor was a custom on the first night of Passover. By this point, Judas had learned what he needed to know to betray Jesus, for he had learned their plans for the remainder of the evening. Jesus “went out with his disciples across the brook Kidron, where there was a garden, which he and his disciples entered. Now Judas, who betrayed him, also knew the place, for Jesus often met there with his disciples” (John 18:1-2). Judas thus brought a band of soldiers and officers from the Jewish authorities to arrest him. It was at this point that Judas betrayed Jesus with a kiss. Why bother with this if Jesus was so well known? Even though Jesus was a public figure, the guards might not know him by sight. Also, it was dark, and they would be viewing the scene in the garden by torchlight. Even Judas himself might not recognize Jesus until getting up close to him. By arranging the kiss, Judas apparently wanted a degree of protection. If he suddenly yelled, “This is Jesus! Grab him!”, that would make it obvious to everyone that Judas had betrayed him. A mêlée might ensue, and Judas might be injured or killed by one of the other disciples. But by coming up and giving the ordinary greeting gesture of a kiss, Judas would make the act of betrayal non-obvious. From Judas’s perspective, he might get away scot-free, with nobody realizing what he had done. However, Jesus knew what Judas was up to. “Jesus said to him, ‘Judas, would you betray the Son of man with a kiss?’” (Luke 22:48). From Jesus’ perspective—as tragic as it was—everything was proceeding according to plan Used from https://www.catholic.com/magazine/online-edition/the-spy-mission-of-judas-iscariot?_gl=1*o8hg84*_up*MQ..*_ga*MTE4NDIxOTY1Ni4xNzExNTQ4OTAx*_ga_C1P2JNZ1YB*MTcxMTU0ODkwMC4xLjAuMTcxMTU0ODkwMC4wLjAuMA.. Please join me at 3:30 pm Eastern (US) time for the Chaplet of Divine Mercy, Saint of the Day and Daily Update. I have nine beautiful prayer pamphlets that contain the Story of the Miraculous Medal and include a Miraculous Medal. I will give one each day from Good Friday through and including Mercy Sunday to the first person each day at 3:30 p.m. who calls 515-602-9655 and prays the Divine Mercy Novena with me. One winner per address. If you are a winner, find me on Facebook at https://www.facebook.com/kathleens.captain.crash to send me your address for your prize. You MUST pray with me live online to claim your prize. Starting on Good Friday, March 29, 2024, we will be praying the Divine Mercy Novena on the Chaplet of Divine Mercy show and will extend the show to one full hour for the nine days between Good Friday and Mercy Sunday (April 7, 2024). The prayers will come from here: https://www.thedivinemercy.org/message/devotions/novena Please visit our friends, Tony and Paulette Rock at the Rock Company Shop. I have received not one, but TWO orders from Tony and Paulette and have been thrilled with my purchases. I'll never buy olive wood anything from anyone else ever again! I'm even going to talk to my pastor about selling things from Tony and Paulette at the annual church olive wood materials sale. Websites I regularly mention in my broadcast include: Morning Offering (www.mortningoffering.com) and Catholic Online (www.catholic.org). Franciscan Media (Franciscanmedia.org) is another site that I peruse regularly. I love ewtn.com for its religious programming and often listen live on my computer. I also play its television on my computer since EWTN is not carried on DirecTV Stream. Finally, I love the Guadalupe Radio Network and my Alabama feed!

Saint Margaret Clitherow was a sixteenth century saint who lived in England during turbulent times for thew Church there., having been born around 20 years after Henry VIII rejected the pope's authority and martyred Saint Thomas More (feast day June 22). Image retrieved from http://www.yorkshireguides.com/margaret_clitherows_house.html and used as being in the public domain. Saint Margaret Clitherow was born around the year 1556 - about 21 years after the martyrdom of Saint Thomas More in 1535 because he chose God over the king of England. Her lifetime was a difficult time for the Roman Catholic Church in England. The Catholic Church was then outlawed in England and all of Great Britain as it existed at the time. She was one of five children born to Thomas and Jane Middleton. Thomas was a respected businessman, wax chandler (one who watched over Candles and candle rooms in large houses) and the Sheriff of York in 1564. He died around 1570, when Saint Margaret was but 14. In 1571, around the age of 14 or 15, she married John Clitherow, a wealthy butcher and a chamberlain of York, where they lived. Together, they had three children. In 1574, Saint Margaret Clitherow converted to Catholicism. While John remained a member of the Church of England, he supported her in her Catholicism and even paid her fines for not attending church. Yes, in those days, there were fines imposed for not attending the Church of England every week. John Clitherow was supportive because his father was a Catholic priest. She was imprisoned in the York Castle two times before her final arrest, both times for missing church. Her son, William, was born in prison. She learned to read Latin while in prison. As a Catholic, she began to harbor fugitive priests from the government. This was made a capitol offense by the Jesuits, etc. Act of 1584. Saint Margaret had two places where she hid priests and where Mass was said - back ion this time, Mass was "said", not celebrated. One was adjacent to her house. However, once her house came under surveillance, she rented a house some distance away where she could hide and maintain priests and where Mass could be said. Her eldest son, Henry, was sent to the English school in France to be trained as a priest. John Clitherow was summoned bye the authorities to be questioned on why his son was sent abroad to study. The Clitherow house was searched in 1586. A young boy, frightened by the search, showed the authorities where the priests were hidden. Saint Margaret Clitherow was arrested and brought before the court, where she refused to enter a plea. Her refusal to enter a plea resulted no trial and created a situation whereby her children would not be called to testify at trial. She was sentenced to death. She was executed on March 26, 1586, which happened to be Good Friday that year at the Toll Booth at Ouse Bridge. She was executed by being crushed by her own door, as standard indictment to force people to testify. A small, sharp rock Wass placed under her back, and the door was placed on top of her, weighted down by heavy rocks, which crushed her. She died within 15 minutes. She was pregnant with her fourth child when she was executed. Saint Margaret Clitherow's execution caused quite a controversy with Queen Elizabeth I, who wrote a rather tersely-worded letter to the people of York about their treatment and execution of a woman. Saint Margaret Clitherow was beatified by Pope Pius XI in 1929. She was canonized by Pope Saint Paul VI (feast day May 29). Please join me at 3:30 pm Eastern (US) time for the Chaplet of Divine Mercy, Saint of the Day and Daily Update. I have nine beautiful prayer pamphlets that contain the Story of the Miraculous Medal and include a Miraculous Medal. I will give one each day from Good Friday through and including Mercy Sunday to the first person each day at 3:30 p.m. who calls 515-602-9655 and prays the Divine Mercy Novena with me. One winner per address. If you are a winner, find me on Facebook at https://www.facebook.com/kathleens.captain.crash to send me your address for your prize. You MUST pray with me live online to claim your prize. Starting on Good Friday, March 29, 2024, we will be praying the Divine Mercy Novena on the Chaplet of Divine Mercy show. The prayers will come from here: https://www.thedivinemercy.org/message/devotions/novena Please visit our friends, Tony and Paulette Rock at the Rock Company Shop. Websites I regularly mention in my broadcast include: Morning Offering (www.mortningoffering.com) and Catholic Online (www.catholic.org). Franciscan Media (Franciscanmedia.org) is another site that I peruse regularly. I love ewtn.com for its religious programming and often listen live on my computer. I also play its television on my computer since EWTN is not carried on DirecTV Stream. Finally, I love the Guadalupe Radio Network and my Alabama feed!

In reality, all that we know about Saint Lea comes from her friend and contemporary, Saint Jerome (feast day September 30 - Doctor of the Church). It is contained in a letter to Saint Marcella (feast day January 31). Join me in my quest to learn a little something about Saint Lea! Image retrieved from https://www.saintsfeastfamily.com/copy-of-st-lea-march-22 and used as being in the public domain Saint Lea appears to have been friends with Saint Jerome, the scholarly monk who translated the Bible into Latin from its original Greek. It appears that she was of a Roman noble family and that she married at a young age. However, she was widowed early into thew marriage and was left on sound financial footing by her deceased husband. However, rather than retire and live off of the money her husband left her, she chose, instead, to join a group of consecrated virgins living in a convent in the city and gave up her riches. She used her money to support the convent, which was run by Saint Marcella (I remember a Sister Marcella from the Teaching Sisters of Notre Dame de Namur, who was one of may teachers at St. Thomas More back home in Decatur and every time I read or type that name, I think of her). Saint Lea took on the most menial tasks and no job was too dirty for her. Eventually, she was the Superior and/or Prioress of the convent. From all appearances, Saint Lea died in 384, while Saint Jerome and Saint Marcella were working on and reading the 73rd Psalm. Moreover, it appears that Saint Jerome is writing to others and Saint Marcella to inform them of the death of Saint Lea. Because Saint Jerome does not write about Lea biographically, it gives the impression that Saint Marcella knew Saint Lea. Saint Jerome refers to Saint Lea as being "blessed", which indicates that she was worthy of going straight to Heaven. Saint Jerome concentrates on Saint Lea's virtues. In his letter, Saint Jerome first compares Saint Lea to the parable of Lazarus and draws some rather deep parallels: "Who will praise the blessed Lea as she deserves? She renounced painting her face and adorning her head with shining pearls. She exchanged her rich attire for sackcloth, and ceased to command others in order to obey all. She dwelt in a corner with a few bits of furniture; she spent her nights in prayer, and instructed her companions through her example rather than through protests and speeches. And she looked forward to her arrival in heaven in order to receive her recompense for the virtues which she practiced on earth." Saint Jerome goes on to compare Saint Lea to the Roman consul who lives his life in lavish luxury and finds himself burning in hell in pure agony in the afterlife: "We must not allow … money to weigh us down, or lean upon the staff of worldly power. We must not seek to possess both Christ and the world. No; things eternal must take the place of things transitory; and since, physically speaking, we daily anticipate death, if we wish for immortality we must realize that we are but mortal." In so doing, Saint Jerome appears to be emphasizing to Saint Marcella the importance of living for Christ and dying to the secular world, as Saint Lea did. Please join me at 3:30 pm Eastern (US) time for the Chaplet of Divine Mercy, Saint of the Day and Daily Update. I have nine beautiful prayer pamphlets that contain the Story of the Miraculous Medal and include a Miraculous Medal. I will give one each day from Good Friday through and including Mercy Sunday to the first person each day at 3:30 p.m. who calls 515-602-9655 and prays the Divine Mercy Novena with me. One winner per address. If you are a winner, find me on Facebook at https://www.facebook.com/kathleens.captain.crash to send me your address for your prize. You MUST pray with me live online to claim your prize. Starting on Good Friday, March 29, 2024, we will be praying the Divine Mercy Novena on the Chaplet of Divine Mercy show. The prayers will come from here: https://www.thedivinemercy.org/message/devotions/novena Please visit our friends, Tony and Paulette Rock at the Rock Company Shop. Websites I regularly mention in my broadcast include: Morning Offering (www.mortningoffering.com) and Catholic Online (www.catholic.org). Franciscan Media (Franciscanmedia.org) is another site that I peruse regularly. I love ewtn.com for its religious programming and often listen live on my computer. I also play its television on my computer since EWTN is not carried on DirecTV Stream. Finally, I love the Guadalupe Radio Network and my Alabama feed!

Saint Benedicta Cambiagio Frassinello was raised in a family where she received devout training in her rich Catholic Faith. She was married and lived with her husband as husband and wife for two years before taking a joint vow of chastity with her husband. They would both join religious orders before she was called to be a teacher and her husband was pulled out of seminary to work with her in setting up the schools. Join me as we look into the life of Saint Benedicta Cambiagio Frassinello. Image retrieved from https://www.papaboys.me/santa-benita-cambiagio-frassinello-fundadora-el-santo-del-dia-y-su-historia-sabado-21-de-marzo-de-2020/ and used as being in the public domain. Saint Benedicta Cambiagio Frassinello was born October 2, 1791 in Langasco in Genoa Italy. She was the sixth of six children born to Giuseppe Cambiagio and Francesca Ghiglione. During her childhood and adolescence, the region of Genoa was subject to significant political discord, chaos and upheaval. As a result, her family moved and settled in Pavia, a small town in Lombardy in northern Italy. The family settled in Pavia in 1804. Seven years later, in 1811, Saint Benedicta had a spiritual experience that led her to know that she w2anted to live a life of penance and mortification. However, out of obedience to her parents, she married Giovanni Battista Frassinello in the Basilica of San Michele on February 7, 1816. Giovanni was a farmer and a carpenter. For two years, they lived together as husband and wife. After two years of marriage, they decided to live a celibate life together like brother and sister. This was because Giovanni was totally impressed with Saint Benedicta's holiness and her desire to live a religious life. At some point, the couple took in Saint Benedicta's sister, Maria, as she suffered from intestinal cancer. Maria had been left by her husband. They cared for Maria until her death in July of 1825. Giovanni joined the Somaschi Fathers founded by Saint Jerome Emiliani (feast day February 8). Saint Benedicta joined the Ursulines of Capriolo. However, she was sent home after a year due to bad health. She returned to Pavia and prayed for the intercession of St. Jerome Emiliani for an improvement to her health. Her prayers were answered, and she went to the Bishop of Pavia, Luigi Tosi, and sought permission to dedicate herself to the education for young girls. Bishop Tosi asked Giovanni to leave the seminary of the Somaschi Fathers to work alongside Saint Benedicta. The couple made a vow to remain chaste in front of Bishop Tosi, and the pair set off on their mission of the formation of the human condition and religious of formation to the youngest of the abandoned caste of society - the poor and underprivileged. Their work was of such importance to Pavia that a school was opened in 1827. Saint Benedicta's work was of such local importance that the Austrian government recognized Saint Benedicta as a "Promoter of Public Education". Despite their vows of chastity, people still talked about Saint Benedicta and Giovanni. Accordingly, she turned the school and her assets over to the Bishop of Pavia and moved to another city where she again started as new school in Ronco Scrivia in the Genoa region of Italy. On October 28, 1838, Saint Benedicta founded a new order, Benedictine Sisters of Providence. Saint Benedicta was able to guide the formation of the new order until she died on March 21, 1858. Her remains were lost due to Allied bombings of Ronco Scrivia in 1944. Saint Benedicta was declared to be Venerable on July 6, 1985 by Pope Saint John Paul II. She was beatified by Pope Saint John Paul II on May 10, 1987. Saint Benedicta was canonized on May 19, 2002 at ?Saint Peter's Square in Vatican City. Please join me at 3:30 pm Eastern (US) time for the Chaplet of Divine Mercy, Saint of the Day and Daily Update. I have nine beautiful prayer pamphlets that contain the Story of the Miraculous Medal and include a Miraculous Medal. I will give one each day from Good Friday through and including Mercy Sunday to the first person each day at 3:30 p.m. who calls 515-602-9655 and prays the Divine Mercy Novena with me. One winner per address. If you are a winner, find me on Facebook at https://www.facebook.com/kathleens.captain.crash to send me your address for your prize. You MUST pray with me live online to claim your prize. Starting on Good Friday, March 29, 2024, we will be praying the Divine Mercy Novena on the Chaplet of Divine Mercy show. The prayers will come from here: https://www.thedivinemercy.org/message/devotions/novena Please visit our friends, Tony and Paulette Rock at the Rock Company Shop. Websites I regularly mention in my broadcast include: Morning Offering (www.mortningoffering.com) and Catholic Online (www.catholic.org). Franciscan Media (Franciscanmedia.org) is another site that I peruse regularly. I love ewtn.com for its religious programming and often listen live on my computer. I also play its television on my computer since EWTN is not carried on DirecTV Stream. Finally, I love the Guadalupe Radio Network and my Alabama feed!

The origins of Saint Cuthbert are steeped in mystery. Was he Irish? Was he Scottish? Was he a Briton? Does anyone know? He was orphaned at an early age and may have spent time shepherding and may have even fought the Mercians before becoming a monk. Let's piece it all together as best we can. Image retriever from https://www.johnsanidopoulos.com/2015/03/saint-cuthbert-bishop-of-lindesfarne.html and used as being in the public domain. Saint Cuthbert was born around the year 634. He died March 20, 687. He became a monk at Melrose Abbey. Around the year 661, Saint Cuthbert accompanied Saint Eata (feast day October 26) to Ripon Abbey, which had been built by the prior of Melrose Abbey. He returned to Melrose Abbey when the abbey had been turned over to Saint Wilfrid (feast day October 12). Apparently, Saint Cuthbert and Saint Wilfrid had a difference of opinion about something. Saint Wilfrid was appointed abbot by King Alcfrid. Saint Cauthbert and Saint Eata returned to Melrose Abbey around 662. Upon their arrival, they found Melrose Abbey gripped in illness. Even Saint Cuthbert caught the bug. While he was recovering, the proper of the monastery died and Saint Cuthbert found himself made prior in the absence of the prior. It is important to note that Melrose Abbey was a daughter-house of the Abbey at Lindisfarn. Cuthbert was engaged in missionary work when Saint Colmán of Lindisfarne (feast day February 18), who was bishop of Lindisfarne, refused to accept the ruling of the Council of Whitby which declared that the Roman rite and not the Celtic rite would be the acceptable liturgy. Saint Colmán immigrated to Ireland together with most of the monks from Lindisfarne. Saint Eata was then appointed Bishop of Lindisfarne, at which point he appointed Saint Cuthbert as Prior of Lindisfarne. He then resumed his missionary work before receiving the permission of his abbot to become a hermit. During the time of his hermitage, Saint Cuthbert would receive guests. Eventually, he stopped accepting visitors, with some exceptions, but only opened his window to give blessings. This came to an end when he was, against his will, named Bishop of Hexham. He arranged to switch sees with Saint Eata and become Bishop of Lindisfarne, where he would live out the remainder of his days. According to Saint Bede the Venerable (feast day May 25), eleven years after his death, Saint Cuthbert's body was incorrupt. There is no indication of its condition today. It did get moved around a lot with the various invasions of England by the Danes and by the Normans. Please join me at 3:30 pm Eastern (US) time for the Chaplet of Divine Mercy, Saint of the Day and Daily Update. I have nine beautiful prayer pamphlets that contain the Story of the Miraculous Medal and include a Miraculous Medal. I will give one each day from Good Friday through and including Mercy Sunday to the first person each day at 3:30 p.m. who calls 515-602-9655 and prays the Divine Mercy Novena with me. One winner per address. If you are a winner, find me on Facebook at https://www.facebook.com/kathleens.captain.crash to send me your address for your prize. You MUST pray with me live online to claim your prize. Starting on Good Friday, March 29, 2024, we will be praying the Divine Mercy Novena on the Chaplet of Divine Mercy show. The prayers will come from here: https://www.thedivinemercy.org/message/devotions/novena Please visit our friends, Tony and Paulette Rock at the Rock Company Shop. Websites I regularly mention in my broadcast include: Morning Offering (www.mortningoffering.com) and Catholic Online (www.catholic.org). Franciscan Media (Franciscanmedia.org) is another site that I peruse regularly. I love ewtn.com for its religious programming and often listen live on my computer. I also play its television on my computer since EWTN is not carried on DirecTV Stream. Finally, I love the Guadalupe Radio Network and my Alabama feed!