Friday June 13, 2025
Memorial of Saint Anthony of Padua, Priest and Doctor of the Church
(click here to listen to or read today’s scriptures)
Anthony
Brothers and sisters:
We hold this treasure in earthen vessels,
that the surpassing power may be of God and not from us.
We are afflicted in every way, but not constrained;
perplexed, but not driven to despair;
persecuted, but not abandoned;
struck down, but not destroyed;
always carrying about in the Body the dying of Jesus,
so that the life of Jesus may also be manifested in our body.
The intimate connection of life and death rests not just in our physical nature but also our spiritual self. I must die to live. Perhaps that is true for my body, it is certainly true for my spirit. The fallen nature follows me like a pet snake, a parasite unable to get along without my body as host but sucking that body dry to preserve itself.
So I am afflicted, constrained, perplexed, persecuted and struck down. But not destroyed, instead preserved beyond the fallen nature by the dying of Jesus, which I carry about always in the midst of my entire self. Heaven comes down and glory fills my soul.
The one who raised the Lord Jesus
will raise us also with Jesus
and place us with you in his presence.
Paul inspired the Portuguese Franciscan St. Anthony of Padua (born in Lisbon). Anthony, who died when he was 35 years old, awed audiences with his beautiful voice and eloquent theological expression. He joined the Franciscans just 11 years after Francis founded his order of brothers and was asked, on the spur of the moment, to fill in when neither the Dominicans nor the Franciscans could supply a preacher. When he met his hero soon after, Francis asked him to educate the friars in the Bible and theology.
Many of us ask St. Anthony to pray for us when we lose our keys or wallet. Anthony’s prayerbook, handwritten and irreplaceable, was stolen. Anthony’s prayer was heard by the thief, who returned his book and also returned to the order he had recently left.
I use Apple airtags to find my keys and wallet. When I lose my phone I push a button on my watch and the phone beeps very loudly. St. Anthony must be turning over in his grave.
But when I lose my prayer book, I promise I will ask him to pray for me. And when I do indeed pray in this way, I am confident that I will find what I’ve lost. The confidence is the point, not the finding. I think that’s always what has mattered most, to Paul and to Anthony.
To you will I offer sacrifice of thanksgiving,
and I will call upon the name of the LORD.
(2 Corinthians 4, Psalm 116, Philippians 2, Matthew 5)
(posted at davesandel.net)
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