In Today’s Catholic Reading, Isaiah 10:5-7 & 13-16 tells us that God sent the Assyrians to punish the Ten Northern Kingdoms for the vanity that led them to replace God and His Temple in Jerusalem with a “golden calf”.
The Assyrians were supposed to teach the Ephraimites a lesson and “seize plunder, carry off loot, and tread them down like the mud of the streets.” Isaiah tells us that their vanity drove them to do more! “This is not what he (the King of Assyria) intends, nor does he have this in mind; rather, it is in his heart to destroy, to make an end of many nations.”
Isaiah lets us see the actual words that echo in the self-loving people of every generation who live by the Assyrian King’s words:
“For he says, ‘By my own power I have done it, and by my wisdom, for I am shrewd. I have moved the boundaries of peoples, their treasures have I pillaged, and like a giant, I have put down the enthroned. My hand has seized like a nest the riches of nations; as one takes eggs left alone, so I took in all the earth; no one fluttered a wing, or opened a mouth, or chirped.‘”
Living echoes of Assyrian Kings include armed Communists, Religious Groups, Earth Worshippers, and others who take all they can from the neighbors they despise.
Psalm 94: 1-10 & 14-15 gives God’s Promise of help in every Age: “The Lord will not abandon His people.” God sees every sin committed against “His” born and unborn “people”. “Shall He Who shaped the ear not hear? Or, He Who formed the eye not see? Shall He Who instructs nations not chastise…? But Judgment shall again be wth justice, and all the upright of heart shall follow it.”
Attacks from neighbor-hating Assyrians in every Age help Catholics find God’s Comfort in Today’s “Alleluia” from Matthew 11:21,
“Blessed are You, Father, Lord of Heaven and Earth, You have revealed to little ones the mysteries of The Kingdom.”
Catholics prove ourselves to be among God’s Blessed “little ones” because we live by what is “revealed by The Father” in Today’s Daily Catholic Reading from Mt. 11:25-27,
“At that time, Jesus exclaimed: ‘I give praise to You, Father, Lord of Heaven and earth, for although You have hidden these things from the wise and the learned, You have revealed them to the childlike.”
Catholics are specifically included among God’s blessed, “childlike” people: “Yes, Father, such has been your gracious will. All things have been handed over to me by my Father. No one knows the Son except the Father, and no one knows the Father except the Son and anyone to whom the Son wishes to reveal him.”
May all be blessed to read that in such a “childlike way” that we are blessed to ask God to “reveal” reasons to “Be Catholic!”
Those blessed to be that “childlike” may be forever among those called to solve “the mysteries of The Kingdom” by getting the “keys” to “The Kingdom of Heaven” that He Who Fulfilled The Prophecies gave His Life to “reveal” and “give” to His First Catholic Pope and every Catholic on earth for the past 2,000 years:
“And I say unto you: ‘Thou art Peter, and on this rock I build My Church and the gates of hell shall not prevail against it. I give you the keys to The Kingdom of Heaven.'”
Those blessed to be “childlike” enough to “Be Catholic!” realize those “keys to The Kingdom of Heaven” have been “revealed” seven times!!!!!!! as The Seven Catholic Sacraments: Baptism, Confession/Absolution, Communion, Confirmation, Marriage, Healing, and the Holy Orders, which are “revealed” to take living form among God’s most “childlike” people: His Catholic priests, religious, and Catholics!
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Today’s Simple Rhyme: “Catholics do well. / We stay out of hell.”
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