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May 27, 2022 | catholicnewsherald.com

Roman martyrs Sts. Marcellinus and Peter remembered June 2

On June 2, the Catholic Church remembers two fourthcentury martyrs, Sts. Marcellinus and Peter, who were highly venerated after the discovery of their tomb and the conversion of their executioner.

Although the biographical details of these two martyrs are largely unknown, it is known that they lived and died during the reign of the Roman Emperor Diocletian. In 302, the ruler changed his tolerant stance towards Christians and pursued a brutal policy intended to eliminate the Church from the empire.

Diocletian and his subordinate ordered the burning of Catholic churches and their sacred texts, as well as the imprisonment and torture of clergy and laypersons. His goal was to force Christians to submit to the Roman pagan religion, including the worship of the emperor himself as divine.

It was at the mid-point of this persecution, around 303, that a Roman exorcist by the name of Peter was imprisoned for his faith. While in prison, tradition holds that Peter freed Paulina, the daughter of the prisonkeeper Artemius, from demonic influence by his prayers.

This demonstration of Christ’s power over demons is said to have brought about the conversion of Paulina, Artemius, his wife and the entire household – all of whom were baptized by the Roman priest Marcellinus.

After this, both Marcellinus and Peter were called before a judge who was determined to enforce the emperor’s decree against the Church. When Marcellinus testified courageously to his faith in Christ, he was beaten, stripped of his clothes and deprived of food in a dark cell filled with broken glass shards.

Peter, too, was returned to his confinement. But neither man would deny Christ, and both preferred death over submission to the cult of pagan worship.

It was arranged for the two men to be executed secretly, to prevent the faithful from gathering in prayer and veneration at the place of their burial. Their executioner forced them to

clear away a tangle of thorns and briars, which the two men did cheerfully, accepting their death with joy. Both men were beheaded in the forest and buried in the clearing they had made. The location of the saints’ bodies Illumination from the Passionary of Weissenau (c. 1170-1200) by Frater Rufillus, depicting the martyrdom of Sts. Peter and Marcellinus remained unknown for some time, until a devout woman named Lucilla received a revelation informing her where the priest and exorcist lay. With the assistance of another woman, Firmina, Lucilla recovered the two saints’ bodies and had them re-interred in the Roman Catacombs. Sts. Marcellinus and Peter are among the saints named in the Western Church’s most traditional Eucharistic Prayer, the Roman Canon. Pope St. Damasus I, who was himself a great devotee of the Church’s saints during his life, composed an epitaph to mark the tombs of the two martyrs. The source of his knowledge, he said, was the executioner himself, who had subsequently repented and joined the Catholic Church. — Benjamin Mann, Catholic News Agency

Daily Scripture readings

MAY 29-JUNE 4

Sunday: Acts 7:55-60, Revelation 22:12-14, 16-17, 20, John 17:20-26; Monday: Acts 19:1-8, John 16:29-33; Tuesday (The Visitation of the Blessed Virgin Mary): Zephaniah 3:1418, Isaiah 12:2-6, Luke 1:39-56; Wednesday (St. Justin): Acts 20:28-38, John 17:11b-19; Thursday (Sts. Marcellinus and Peter): Acts 22:30, 23:6-11, John 17:20-26; Friday (St. Charles Lwanga and Companions): Acts 25:13b-21, John 21:15-19; Saturday: Acts 28:16-20, 30-31, John 21:20-25 JUNE 5-11

Sunday (Pentecost Sunday): Acts 2:1-11, 1 Corinthians 12:3b-7, 12-13, John 20:19-23; Monday (The Blessed Virgin Mary, Mother of the Church): Genesis 3:9-15, John 19:2534; Tuesday: 1 Kings 17:7-16, Matthew 5:13-16; Wednesday: 1 Kings 18:20-39, Matthew 5:1719; Thursday (St. Ephrem): 1 Kings 18:41-46, Matthew 5:20-26; Friday: 1 Kings 19:9a, 11-16, Matthew 5:27-32; Saturday (St. Barnabas): Acts 11:21b-26, 13:1-3, Matthew 5:33-37 JUNE 12-18

Sunday (The Most Holy Trinity): Proverbs 8:22-31, Romans 5:1-5, John 16:12-15; Monday (St. Anthony of Padua): 1 Kings 21:1-16, Matthew 5:38-42; Tuesday: 1 Kings 21:17-29, Matthew 5:43-48; Wednesday: 2 Kings 2:1, 6-14, Matthew 6:1-6, 16-18; Thursday: Sirach 48:1-14, Matthew 6:7-15; Friday: 2 Kings 11:1-4, 9-18, 20, Matthew 6:19-23; Saturday: 2 Chronicles 24:17-25, Matthew 6:24-34

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CATHOLIC NEWS HERALDI 3

Pope Francis

Elderly must share life’s wisdom with the young

Seeing all the violence and injustice in the world, people easily grow disillusioned and wonder about the meaning of life, but Christians must fight the temptation of weariness with faith and a passion for justice, Pope Francis said.

Progress in science and technology and knowledge in general continues to advance, but “the wisdom of life is something else entirely, and it seems to be stalled,” the pope said May 25 at his weekly general audience in St. Peter’s Square.

‘Elders rich in wisdom and humor do so much good to the young,’

Continuing his series of talks about old age, the pope looked at the Bible’s Book of Ecclesiastes and its refrain, “Vanity of vanities. All is vanity.”

Especially as they get older, the pope said, people naturally ask if their lives have made any difference and if anyone is capable of showing the difference between the just and the unjust.

The Christian response cannot be resignation or giving in to weariness, which early Christian monks identified as the vice of “sloth,” he said.

The author of Ecclesiastes, he said, reflects on how easy it is to grow disillusioned with life and to give up the struggle to make the world a better place, but the author also insists the best remedy is to “fear God and keep His commandments.”

“Elders rich in wisdom and humor do so much good to the young,” the pope insisted. “They save them from the temptation of a grim worldly knowledge devoid of the wisdom of life. And also, these elders bring young people back to Jesus’ promise, ‘Blessed are those who hunger and thirst for righteousness, for they will be filled.’”

The pope, who is 85, said he and every other older person has “a very great mission in the world,” which is to “sow hunger and thirst for righteousness in the young.”

“It is no accident that ours is the season of fake news, collective superstitions and pseudo-scientific truths,” the pope said.

The only antidote is the wisdom that comes from devotion to God and to doing God’s will, he said.