😎🐫🎤 Christ’s peace and presence be with you. After hearing Monday’s Old Testament Mass reading and following that up with the daily quote from Archbishop Fulton Sheen, truth, wise counsel, and the courage to stand for what is right were certainly the theme for the day.
Let’s start with an introduction to the Old Testament reading, Daniel 13. Two male elders, judges, could not contain their lust for Susanna, “a very beautiful and God-fearing woman,” who was married to Joakim. Together the elders plotted to force Susanna to give into their sexual desires or they would testify against her that they caught her with a young man. ‘“I am completely trapped,” Susanna groaned. “If I yield, it will be my death; if I refuse, I cannot escape your power. Yet it is better for me to fall into your power without guilt than to sin before the Lord.”’
The two males turned Susanna into the authorities with the intention of having her put to death. At the hearing, the assembly believed the two men, “since they were elders and judges of the people” and Susanna was condemned to death. Susanna cried out aloud to the Lord about the false testimony of the men. “The Lord heard her prayer. As she was being led to execution, God stirred up the Holy Spirit of a young boy named Daniel, and he cried aloud: “I will have no part in the death of this woman…Are you such fools, O children of Israel! To condemn a woman of Israel without examination and without clear evidence? Return to court, for they have testified falsely against her.”
Daniel was given the authority to cross examine the two men separately to get to the truth of the matter. Daniel stated, “…tell me under what tree you saw them together.” One replied a mastic tree and the other replied an oak. “The whole assembly cried aloud, blessing God who saves those who hope in him. They rose up against the two old men, for by their own words Daniel had convicted them of bearing false witness. They condemned them to the fate they had planned for their neighbor: in accordance with the law of Moses they put them to death. Thus was innocent blood spared that day.”
Onto Archbishop Fulton Sheen’s quote. “Truth does grow, but it grows homogeneously, like an acorn into an oak…The nature of certain things is fixed, and none more so than the nature of truth. Truth may be contradicted a thousand times, but that only proves that it is strong enough to survive a thousand assaults.”
Let me say that again, “Truth may be contradicted a thousand times, but that only proves that it is strong enough to survive a thousand assaults.”
The truth IS the truth and there is no changing that. In every moment, we need to choose to stand for the truth, which is not always an easy task. But like Susanna, she knew the only real option was to stand in truth with the Lord. Our spirit and physical being are under constant attack from Satan and his band of demons. We are tasked to not be fearful, stand united, seek the truth, and act justly to maintain it. It’s not always easy, but there is no better way in this life.
Bless others and be blessed.
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Third Day Devotions 