+ ALL SAINTS’ MEN’S GROUP MEETS TUESDAY MORNING AT 7:00 AM
+ THE WEDNESDAY AGAPE MEAL AND CHRISTIAN ED BEGINS AT 5:45 PM WITH DINNER; CLASSES MEET FROM 6:30 PM – 7:15 PM. THE MENU THIS WEEK IS PORK ROAST WITH VEGETABLES, CORNBREAD, AND FRUIT.
MASS SCHEDULE FOR THE WEEK OF EPIPHANY III (JANUARY 22, 2012)
23, Monday – Feria
24, Tuesday – St. Timothy, Bishop/Martyr
25, Wednesday – Conversion of St. Paul
26, Thursday – St. Polycarp, Bishop/Martyr
27, Friday – St. John Chrysostom, Bishop, Confessor, Doctor
St. Timothy traveled and preached the Gospel with his mentor St. Paul. He was martyred around the year AD 80.
St. Polycarp (AD 69-155) was the Bishop of Smyrna and according to Irenaeus who heard him preach when he was a child, he was instructed and ordained by the Beloved Disciple, St. John. It appears to me that he may have been already associated with Smyrna when St. John wrote his Revelation. Smyrna happens to be addressed in Revelation 2:8-11. Ignatius of Antioch wrote Polycarp on his way to Rome where he was martyred in the Coliseum in AD 108 at the age of 73. He was eaten by lions, but as he was taken to Rome by a 10 Roman soldiers he was mistreated: “From Syria even to Rome I fight with wild beasts, by land and sea, by night and by day, being bound amidst ten leopards, even a company of soldiers, who only grow worse when they are kindly treated —Ignatius to the Romans, 5.
St. John Chrysostom, known for his eloquent preaching and his love for the poor, the sick, the homeless and the hungry. His fame as a liturgist survives even today in the Liturgy of St. John Chrysostom which is the Liturgy of most Eastern Orthodox Churches. His disciple St. Proclus, who followed him as the Patriarch of Constantinople (434-447) preached a homily praising his teacher: “O John, your life was filled with sorrow, but your death was glorious. Your grave is blessed and reward is great, by the grace and mercy of our Lord Jesus Christ O graced one, having conquered the bounds of time and place!”