Association Of Catholic Bloggers

Fr Charles Duster (15 September 1934 - 7 March 2017) Father Charlie was born on 15 September 1934 in Cedar Rapids, Iowa, USA, where his parents Charles Henry Duster ['DOOster'] and Cleo Catherine Handley Duster owned and operated a supermarket. He has an older brother William C. Duster (Audrey) of Littleton, Colorado, a sister Mrs Robert Enns (Katie) of Fort Pierce, Florida, and eleven nieces and nephews and their families. His older sister, Margaret Jeanne Duster, died in 1972.

Famous Bernini angel sculpture on San Angelo bridge  in Rome, Italy  Many statues of the outdoor statues in Rome are on the top of churches, seen only from a  distance. The statues are huge (up to 20ft/6m) with some details sculpted at a larger scale to make them visible. continue

St Matthew , El Greco,1610-14 Readings   (New American Bible: Philippines, USA) Readings   (Jerusalem Bible: Australia, England & Wales, India [optional], Ireland, New Zealand, Pakistan, Scotland, South Africa)  Gospel   Matthew 21:28-32  ( New Revised Standard Version, Catholic Edition : Canada Jesus said to the chief priest and the elders of the people: “What do you think? A man had two sons; he went to the first and said, ‘Son, go and work in the vineyard today.’   He answered, ‘I will not’; but later he changed his mind and went.   The father   went to the second and said the same; and he answered, ‘I go, sir’; but he did not go.   Which of the two did the will of his father?” continue> The above scene, at the Coliseum in Rome, comes shortly before the end of the 1983 made-for-TV move,  The Scarlet and the Black , which tells the true World War II story of Vatican-based Irish priest Monsignor Hugh O'Fla...

, The Charity of St Lawrence , Bernardo Strozzi, painted 1639-40 Readings   (New American Bible: Philippines, USA) Readings (Jerusalem Bible: Australia, England & Wales, India [optional], Ireland, New Zealand, Pakistan, Scotland, South Africa)  Gospel  John 6:41-51  (Revised Standard Version – Catholic Edition) The Jews then murmured at Jesus, because he said, "I am the bread which came down from heaven." They said, "Is not this Jesus, the son of Joseph, whose father and mother we know? How does he now say, 'I have come down from heaven'?" Jesus answered them, "Do not murmur among yourselves. No one can come to me unless the Father who sent me draws him; and I will raise him up at the last day. It is written in the prophets, 'And they shall all be taught by God.' Every one who has heard and learned from the Father comes to me. Not that any one has seen the Father except him who is from God; he has seen the Father. ...

Today the Church honours  St Sixtus II and Companions , martyred in Rome on 6 August AD 258. Sixtus had been pope for just under a year. We can read about the deaths of these martyrs in the Office of Readings which includes an extract from a letter of St Cyprian:  Know that Sixtus and four of the deacons were beheaded in the cemetery on 6 August. Moreover, the Prefects of the City are pursuing the persecution relentlessly; if any suspected Christians are brought before them they will be executed and their property confiscated . The six deacons were  Januarius, Vincentius, Magnus, Stephanus, Felicissimus  and  Agapitus . Four days later the great  St Laurence of Rome , another deacon, was martyred. The names of Sts Sixtus, Cyprian and Laurence appear in the Roman Canon (Eucharistic Prayer I). I wonder did St Cyprian, as he wrote, have any inkling of the fact that he too would be beheaded in the same persecution under the Emperor Valerian, ...