A Holy Life

Saint Elizabeth of Hungary

Religious, Widow (1207-1231)

Patron Saint of the homeless

Feast day – November 17

In her short life Elizabeth manifested such great love for the poor and suffering that she has become the patroness of Catholic charities and of the Secular Franciscan Order.

 

The daughter of the King of Hungary, Elizabeth chose a life of penance and asceticism when a life of leisure and luxury could easily have been hers. This choice endeared her in the hearts of the common people throughout Europe. At the age of 14 Elizabeth was married to Louis of Thuringia (a German principality), whom she deeply loved; she bore three children. Under the spiritual direction of a Franciscan friar, she led a life of prayer, sacrifice and service to the poor and sick. Seeking to become one with the poor, she wore simple clothing.

 

Daily she would take bread to hundreds of the poorest in the land, who came to her gate. After six years of marriage, her husband died in the Crusades, and she was grief-stricken. Her husband’s family looked upon her as squandering the royal purse, and mistreated her, finally throwing her out of the palace. The return of her husband’s allies from the Crusades resulted in her being reinstated, since her son was legal heir to the throne. In 1228 Elizabeth joined the Secular Franciscan Order, spending the remaining few years of her life caring for the poor in a hospital which she founded in honour of St. Francis. Elizabeth’s health declined, and she died before her 24th birthday in 1231. Her great popularity resulted in her canonization four years later.

Elizabeth understood well the lesson Jesus taught when he washed his disciples' feet at the Last Supper: The Christian must be one who serves the humblest needs of others, even if one serves from an exalted position. Of royal blood, Elizabeth could have lorded it over her subjects. Yet she served them with such a loving heart that her brief life won for her a special place in the hearts of many. Elizabeth is also an example to us in her following the guidance of a spiritual director. Growth in the spiritual life is a difficult process. We can play games very easily if we don't have someone to challenge us or to share experiences so as to help us avoid pitfalls.

"Today, there is an inescapable duty to make ourselves the neighbour of every individual, without exception, and to take positive steps to help a neighbour whom we encounter, whether that neighbour be an elderly person, abandoned by everyone, a foreign worker who suffers the injustice of being despised, a refugee, an illegitimate child wrongly suffering for a sin of which the child is innocent, or a starving human being who awakens our conscience by calling to mind the words of Christ: 'As long as you did it for one of these, the least of my brethren, you did it for me' (Matthew 25:40)".

 

Sources for this article were taken from:  AmericanCatholic.org

 

Prayer

Oh Lord,
Grant that your blessed daughter Saint Elizabeth comes to this man/women in their hour of bereavement,
St Elizabeth help us to lighten their burden so that they may know their loved one has gone to the life eternal in the sight of the Lord Our God,Show them that until such time as they meet again, love remains here for them on earth.
In Jesus Name.

Amen.

Saint Elizabeth – Pray for us

Prayer for the Homeless

Dear God,

There is no place like home.
Home is where the heart is. Lose heart... and lose home.
We feel the truth of these words, for home and heart are bound together.
The state of one reflects the state of the other.
For who has not lost his home without feeling like the heart has been cut out of him? And whose heart has not healed faster by being in the right home?

So help me with this prayer.
For I bring to you a brother in need.
He is beloved, Divine and has talents within him to express and share.
But he does not know this.
He lives on the street and eats out of garbage cans.
For living this wretched life, I have blamed and mocked him.
I do not know his name, but call him Homeless.
I do not know what has injured him.
In fact, I do not know him at all.
I have only seen him—sleeping in doorways, wandering aimlessly—staring up at me with hollow eyes.
He barely survives, yet his legacy, as Your Child, is to thrive.
My blaming cannot stir him from his pain, but only increase it.
So I release all blame now and call for compassion to fill me.
Fill me with Your unstoppable energy, Lord.
Fill me with energy that transforms.
Fill me with the desire to pray for him and never lose sight of his Divinity—or mine.
As I pray, positive change occurs in him and in me, for You work miracles everywhere.
I am so grateful that I have a home; that I have a place in which to eat, bathe, rest and love.
I cannot imagine the chaos of living without one.
Therefore, Lord, I declare You intervene on behalf of this beloved.
You fill this one, who is so dear to You and has so many faces—male, female, old and young—with the knowledge of Your most intimate love.
For this is Your Vision: that each of us know our own worth and be nourished.
You enter the hearts, minds and bodies of my brothers and sisters, and awaken within them knowledge of their holiness and gifts.
You call them—and me—to The Work You have laid out for us.
I am filled with Your compassion, O God—so that you are able to use me for the betterment of all.
I commit to Your Holy Vision for the world—and I am lifted
As I am lifted—all humanity is lifted, for macrocosm mirrors microcosm.
Together we rise into attractor fields of nourishment where each of us has a home in which our hearts and bodies find comfort.
Thank You for Your Love, which breaks all boundaries and moves Heaven and Earth for us so that no one is known by the name "homeless."

And so it is.

Amen.

Gospel Reflection

November 16, 2012

Friday – Weekday – Year of Faith

Memorial of St. Margaret of Scotland

by Rev. Fr. Benjo Fajota (Vice Rector of the EDSA Shrine)

5:30  PM Mass at Shrine of Mary, Queen of Peace (Our Lady of EDSA)

Reading 1 2 Jn 4-9

[Chosen Lady:] I rejoiced greatly to find some of your children walking in the truth just as we were commanded by the Father. But now, Lady, I ask you, not as though I were writing a new commandment but the one we have had from the beginning: let us love one another. For this is love, that we walk according to his commandments; this is the commandment, as you heard from the beginning, in which you should walk.

Many deceivers have gone out into the world, those who do not acknowledge Jesus Christ as coming in the flesh; such is the deceitful one and the antichrist. Look to yourselves that you do not lose what we worked for but may receive a full recompense. Anyone who is so "progressive" as not to remain in the teaching of the Christ does not have God; whoever remains in the teaching has the Father and the Son.

Responsorial Psalm Ps 119:1, 2, 10, 11, 17, 18

R. (1b) Blessed are they who follow the law of the Lord!
Blessed are they whose way is blameless,
who walk in the law of the LORD.
R. Blessed are they who follow the law of the Lord!
Blessed are they who observe his decrees,
who seek him with all their heart.
R. Blessed are they who follow the law of the Lord!
With all my heart I seek you;
let me not stray from your commands.
R. Blessed are they who follow the law of the Lord!
Within my heart I treasure your promise,
that I may not sin against you.
R. Blessed are they who follow the law of the Lord!
Be good to your servant, that I may live
and keep your words.
R. Blessed are they who follow the law of the Lord!
Open my eyes, that I may consider
the wonders of your law.
R. Blessed are they who follow the law of the Lord!

Gospel Lk 17:26-37

Jesus said to his disciples: "As it was in the days of Noah, so it will be in the days of the Son of Man; they were eating and drinking, marrying and giving in marriage up to the day that Noah entered the ark, and the flood came and destroyed them all. Similarly, as it was in the days of Lot: they were eating, drinking, buying, selling, planting, building; on the day when Lot left Sodom, fire and brimstone rained from the sky to destroy them all. So it will be on the day the Son of Man is revealed. On that day, someone who is on the housetop and whose belongings are in the house must not go down to get them, and likewise one in the field must not return to what was left behind. Remember the wife of Lot. Whoever seeks to preserve his life will lose it, but whoever loses it will save it. I tell you, on that night there will be two people in one bed; one will be taken, the other left. And there will be two women grinding meal together; one will be taken, the other left." They said to him in reply, "Where, Lord?" He said to them, "Where the body is, there also the vultures will gather."

HOMILY

Our reading is a continuation of the reflection on the end of time. And Jesus is warning is, telling us, in a very very clear manner, that we will now be expecting the end of time as if it were this day, tomorrow, or the next day, that the day of the Son of Man will come. No one knows, only the Father. Nagbigay siya ng ehemplo. Tingnan ninyo 'yong panahon ni Noah at 'yong panahon ni Lot. Kumakain, nag-iinuman, every day, they spend life's monotony, they pre-occupy themselves with life's goings-on. So when they were not expecting it, the day of the Son of Man came. At doon dumating 'yong delubyo.

Ganito rin sa ating panahon ngayon. Baka sinasabi natin, ok lang, hindi tayo pababayaan ng Diyos. Hindi pa tayo kukunin ng Diyos ngayon. Magsaya muna tayo. Let us be merry - live, eat and drink, dahil matagal pa ang pagdating ng katapusan ng mundo. But God is telling us to be always vigilant, to be always prepared. And when Jesus said, 'whoever seeks his life will lose it, and whoever loses his life for the sake of the Gospel will preserve it", He is not speaking of the physical body. He is speaking of the more profound and deeper meaning of our life.

Ang buhay ba natin ay pagpapapayaman lang? Ang buhay ba natin ay para lamang matamo ang ating tagumpay? Ang buhay lang bang ito ay itinalaga ng Diyos para makamit natin ang lahat ng inaasam natin sa buhay? Because of consumerism and materialism, we have already lost the time to be silent, the time to pause, the time to reflect on the deeper meaning of life. Ano ba talaga ang mas mahalaga sa buhay?

Baka katulad din tayo ng mga tao noong panahon ni Noah at ni Lot. Pinagsasabihan na sila, ibinigay na ang babala, ang warning, pero hindi sila nakikinig. At ang ginagawa nila ay patuloy lamang sa kanilang pagkain, pagsasaya at pagkamit nang kung anu-anong inaasam nila sa buhay.

The reason why this Gospel is being presented to us during the last few days of the calendar year of the Church - we are already in the 32nd week - is because the Church is in a cycle. We are to be reminded always that our life here on earth is temporary. The Gospel talks about the second coming of our Lord our Savior, when He will judge us, the living, and the dead. The first coming was when He came first as a child. The second coming, or the parousia, is the Day of the Judgment.

But there is another coming of Christ, that we take for granted and we totally ignore. And that is the coming of Christ in our lives every day. Dumarating sa atin ang presensiya ni Hesus araw-araw sa katauhan ng ating kapwa. Pero hindi natin ito pinapansin. Kung ano ang kailangan nila, mauna na muna dapat ang sa atin - me and my family first. Ganoon ang ating panananampalataya. Ako lang at ang aking Diyos. Wala akong pakialam sa aking kapwa. Tinawag na ang ating pananampalataya ay pagkakaisa - unity, community. There is a common bond of unity that binds us all. And that is Jesus Christ. In our communion - common union - meron tayong pinagsasaluhang common sa bawat isa. At 'yon ay si Kristo. Pag hindi natin kinikilala ang presensiya ni Kristo sa araw-araw na pakikisalamuha natin sa ating kapwa, tulad ng nakikita natin kung paano inaapakan ng ibang tao ang karapatan ng kanilang kapwa, kung paano nila minamaltrato ito, kung paano nila ito binabalewala, makikita natin na kung ano ang ginawa natin sa kaliit-liitan ng ating kapwa, ginawa natin kay Hesus. At kung ano ang ipinagkait natin sa ating kapwa, ipinagkait natin sa Diyos.

Kaya mga kapatid, mabuksan sana ng Salita ng Diyos ang ating mga diwa at ang ating isip kung ano ba ang tunay na mahalaga dito sa ating buhay. Are we so pre-occupied with material things alone? Are we pre-occupied with thinking of ourselves alone? Hilingin natin sa Panginoon na tayo ay maging handa sa pagdating Niya. Nawa'y ang paghahanda natin at pagtulong sa kapwa ay hindi lamang sa salita, ngunit higit sa paggawa, Amen.

Saint Margaret – Pray for us