Daily Gospel Reflection

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March 9, 2024

Saturday of the Third Week of Lent
Lk 18:9-14
Listen to the Audio Version

Jesus addressed this parable
to those who were convinced of their own righteousness
and despised everyone else.
“Two people went up to the temple area to pray;
one was a Pharisee and the other was a tax collector.
The Pharisee took up his position and spoke this prayer to himself,
‘O God, I thank you that I am not like the rest of humanity —
greedy, dishonest, adulterous — or even like this tax collector.
I fast twice a week,
and I pay tithes on my whole income.’
But the tax collector stood off at a distance
and would not even raise his eyes to heaven
but beat his breast and prayed,
‘O God, be merciful to me a sinner.’
I tell you, the latter went home justified, not the former;
for everyone who exalts himself will be humbled,
and the one who humbles himself will be exalted.”

Reflection

Elaine Schmidt '17
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My fiancé and I are participating in wedding preparation classes in anticipation of our summer wedding, and man, they are humbling! One of the biggest challenges is how the activities and inventories force us to analyze our responses to conflict. These conversations have increased my awareness of subtle ways in which I’m approaching our moments of friction with pride and self-righteousness. Rather than looking inward and recognizing ways I’m contributing to negative dynamics, I often seethe, thinking about all that I’ve done right and how it’s my partner who needs to grow.

In therapy and prayer, I’ve been considering ways in which self-righteousness and indignation are sometimes related to my feelings of self-worth. My internal attempt to knock someone else down a peg for their behavior says everything about my self-worth and little about the other person.

The other week, my partner apologized for being snippy with me, and I decided to double down on him, saying, “Do you know how frustrating it is to be on the receiving end of that?” Rather than working on giving my partner more grace—something I need to work on—I wanted to belabor his admission about how he had behaved. It can be so difficult to admit to our shortcomings that we distract ourselves by directing that energy on hating imperfection in others. How much can I resemble the Pharisee from today’s gospel?

This Lent, may we meditate on God’s radical and total love for us as a starting place to accept our own brokenness, lighten up a bit, and make concrete steps toward addressing ways we can improve ourselves and the relationships we have with our loved ones.

Prayer

Rev. Herbert Yost, C.S.C.

Thank you for your gift of this season of Lent, Lord, and for the gentle challenges to personal growth that come through your Son’s word. Grant us the grace to continue loving you and our neighbors so that we may experience the fullness of Easter joy. Amen.

Saint of the Day

St. Dominic Savio

Though he died when he was just 15 years old, St. Dominic Savio displayed a remarkable depth of humanity and holiness. He is one of the youngest non-martyr saints to be canonized by the Church.

He was born in Italy in 1842 to a peasant family and, even as a young boy, had a desire to become a priest. St. John Bosco was fostering vocations among young men who might one day become priests to help him in his work with wayward boys. He took Dominic, aged 12, into his care and training at an oratory that John founded in Turin.

Dominic had clear sight of what was right and wrong and acted decisively. When he received his first Communion, he adopted a personal motto: "Death, but not sin!" He would often slip away from the playground during a recess to make a visit to the Blessed Sacrament.

One time, he broke up a fight between two boys who were ready to beat each other with stones by holding up a crucifix between them. “Before you fight, look at this,” he said. “Say, ‘Jesus Christ was sinless and he died forgiving his executioners. I am a sinner, and I am going to outrage him by being deliberately revengeful.’ Then you can start, and throw your first stone at me.”

Though he was strictly observant of rules, Dominic was also quick to laugh, which sometimes got him into trouble with his superiors. He was also a great storyteller, which endeared him to younger boys especially.

John Bosco led the boys in a healthy and balanced spirituality, insisting on cheerfulness, playfulness, and attentiveness to duties. Dominic followed his lead—he would often say, “I can’t do big things. But I want all I do, even the smallest thing, to be for the greater glory of God.”

John Bosco wrote the biography of Dominic himself and took special care to write only what he had observed himself. He recorded Dominic’s spiritual gifts judiciously, including his supernatural knowledge of people in need or his insight into the future. For example, one time Dominic asked John to follow him into the city. Dominic led the priest to an apartment building, rang on a door, and promptly left. The door was answered by a man who was dying and had just been asking for a priest so he could make his last confession.

Dominic would often get caught up in rapturous prayer—to the point that he would lose track of time or get lost in the experience. On one occasion, he was found standing in the same position in prayer for six hours, thinking that the Mass he had been at had not yet ended. He called them his “distractions,” saying, “It seems as though heaven is opening just above me. I am afraid I may say or do something that will make the other boys laugh.”

Dominic was in poor health, and he was sent home from the oratory in Turin for some fresh air. Doctors diagnosed him with inflammation of the lungs and bled him, according to the practice of the time. Dominic's health slowly declined and received the anointing of the sick before dying on this date in 1857. Just before he died, he sat up and said these last words, “I am seeing the most wonderful things!”

Though many objected to such a young person being held up as a saint, Pope St. Pius X, who began the canonization process for Dominic, said, “A teenager such as Dominic, who bravely struggled to keep his innocence from Baptism to the end of his life, is really a saint.” St. Dominic’s relics rest in the reliquary chapel in the Basilica.

St. Dominic Savio, young teenage saint and visionary—pray for us!


Image Credit: Our featured image of St. Dominic Savio is in the public domain. Last accessed February 6, 2025 on Wikimedia Commons.