Book of Ezekiel

Then he cried loud for me to hear: Come, you scourges of the city!
With that I saw six men coming from the direction of the upper gate which faces the north, each with a destroying weapon in his hand. In their midst was a man dressed in linen, with a writer's case at his waist. They entered and stood beside the bronze altar.
Then he called to the man dressed in linen with the writer's case at his waist,
saying to him: Pass through the city (through Jerusalem) and mark an X on the foreheads of those who moan and groan over all the abominations that are practiced within it.
To the others I heard him say: Pass through the city after him and strike! Do not look on them with pity nor show any mercy!
Old men, youths and maidens, women and children--wipe them out! But do not touch any marked with the X; begin at my sanctuary. So they began with the men (the elders) who were in front of the temple.
Defile the temple, he said to them, and fill the courts with the slain; then go out and strike in the city.
Then the glory of the LORD left the threshold of the temple and rested upon the cherubim.
These lifted their wings, and I saw them rise from the earth, the wheels rising along with them. They stood at the entrance of the eastern gate of the LORD'S house, and the glory of the God of Israel was up above them.
these were the living creatures I had seen beneath the God of Israel by the river Chebar, whom I now recognized to be cherubim.
Each ohad four faces and four wings; something like human hands were under their wings.
Their faces looked just like those I had seen by the river Chebar; each one went straight forward.

Psalms

Praise, you servants of the LORD,
praise the name of the LORD.
Blessed be the name of the LORD
both now and forever.
From the rising to the setting of the sun
is the name of the LORD to be praised.
High above all nations is the LORD;
above the heavens is his glory.
Who is like the LORD, our God, who is enthroned on high
who looks upon the heavens and the earth below?

Holy Gospel of Jesus Christ according to Saint Matthew

Jesus said to his disciples: "If your brother sins against you, go and tell him his fault between you and him alone. If he listens to you, you have won over your brother.
If he does not listen, take one or two others along with you, so that 'every fact may be established on the testimony of two or three witnesses.'
If he refuses to listen to them, tell the church. If he refuses to listen even to the church, then treat him as you would a Gentile or a tax collector.
Amen, I say to you, whatever you bind on earth shall be bound in heaven, and whatever you loose on earth shall be loosed in heaven.
Again, (amen,) I say to you, if two of you agree on earth about anything for which they are to pray, it shall be granted to them by my heavenly Father.
For where two or three are gathered together in my name, there am I in the midst of them."

St. Maximilian Kolbe(Priest and Martyr (1894-1941))

St. Maximilian KolbePriest and Martyr(1894-1941) Raymond Kolbe was born on January 8, 1894, in Zdunska Wola, Poland, when it was occupied by Russia. The Kolbe home was poor but full of love. His parents, hardworking and religious, educated their three sons and gifted them with rectitude. Around 1906, an event took place that marked a fundamental milestone in his life. His mother related the event a few months after her son's martyrdom. "I knew ahead of time, based on an extraordinary event that took place in his infancy, that Maximilian would die a martyr. I just don't recall if it took place before or after his first confession. Once I did not like one of his pranks and I reproached him for it: 'My son, what ever will become of you?' Later, I did not think of it again, but I noticed that the boy had changed so radically, he was hardly recognizable. We had a small altar hidden between two dressers before which he used to often retire without being noticed and he would pray there crying. In general, he had a conduct superior to his age, always recollected and serious and when he prayed he would burst into tears. I was worried, thinking he had some sort of illness so I asked him: 'Is there anything wrong? You should share everything with your mommy!' Trembling with emotion and with his eyes flooded in tears, he shared: 'Mama, when you reproached me, I pleaded with the Blessed Mother to tell me what would become of me. At Church I did the same; I prayed the same thing again. So then the Blessed Mother appeared to me holding in her hands two crowns: one white the other red. She looked at me with tenderness and asked me if I wanted these two crowns. The white one signified that I would preserve my purity and the red that I would be a martyr. I answered that I accepted them...(both of them). Then the Virgin Mary looked at me with sweetness and disappeared.' The extraordinary change in the boys' behavior testified to me the truth of what he related. He was fully conscious and as he spoke to me, with his face radiating; it showed me his desire to die a martyr." When he was 13, he entered the Franciscan Fathers Seminary in the Polish city of Lvov, which was occupied by Austria. It was in the seminary where he adopted the name Maximilian. He later completed his studies in Rome. Before his ordination as a priest in 1918, Maximilian founded the Immaculata Movement devoted to Our Lady. He spread the movement through a magazine entitled "The Knight of the Immaculata." "We should conquer the universe and each soul, now and in the future until the end of time, for the Immaculata and through her for the Sacred Heart of Jesus" (St. Maximilian Maria Kolbe, The Knight of the Immaculata). Maximilian went to Japan and then to India, where he furthered the Movement. After a few years in Japan, he was summoned back to Poland, largely due to his ever-declining health. Three years later, in the midst of the Second World War, he was imprisoned along with other friars and sent to concentration camps in Germany and Poland. In February of 1941, he was again imprisoned and sent to the concentration camp in Auschwitz, where in spite of the terrible living conditions, he continued his ministry. On July 31, 1941, in reprisal for one prisoner's escape, ten men were chosen to die. Father Kolbe offered himself in place of a young husband and father. He was the last to die after two weeks of starvation, thirst and neglect. He was canonized by Pope John Paul II in 1982 as a Martyr of Charity.

Bl. Eberhard()

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Category: Mass by Year / Catholic Missal 2024 / Catholic Missal of august 2024