Saturday of the Eighth week in Ordinary Time
Commentary of the day
Saint Peter Chrysologus (c.406-450), Bishop of Ravenna, Doctor of the Church
Sermon 167 ; CCL 248, 1025 ; PL 52, 636
« John the Baptist came to you..., but you did not believe him » (Mt 21,32)
«John the Baptist proclaimed: 'Repent, for the kingdom of heaven is at hand' « (Mt 3,2)... O blessed John, who desired that conversion precede judgment, that sinners should not be condemned but rewarded, that the unrighteous should enter the Kingdom and not undergo punishment... When did John preach this nearness of the Kingdom of heaven? The world was still in its infancy...; but for us who are announcing this nearness today, the world is extremely antiquated and worn out. It has lost its strength, lost its faculties; suffering weighs it down...; it cries out its exhaustion; it bears all the symptoms of its end...
We are being towed along by a world that passes away, forgetting the world to come. We are greedy for present things but do not take into account the coming judgment. We will not run to meet the Lord as he comes...
Let us turn back, brethren, let us turn back... By the very fact of his delay, of his still waiting, our Lord proves his desire to see us come back to him, his desire that we should not perish. In his great goodness he continues addressing these words to us: «I take no pleasure in the death of the wicked but would rather he would change his ways and live» (Ez 33,11). So let us turn back to him, brethren, not fearing that time is running short. The time that belongs to time's Author cannot be shortened. The proof of it lies in the criminal in the Gospel who, at the moment of dying on the cross, got away with his pardon, grabbed hold of life and, breaking into paradise like a burglar, managed to make his way into the Kingdom (cf. Lk 23,43)!
-St. Augustine