Saint Joseph Catholic Church

At their plenary meeting, the Catholic bishops of India issued a statement calling upon the country’s people to be “ever vigilant against all attempts to undermine the ennobling human vision of the constitution.” They insisted that India must embrace pluralism, warning against a “narrow and divisive cultural nationalism.” In an obvious counter to Hindu nationalists, the bishops suggested that India should endorse “constitutional nationalism.”

Bishop Thomas Daly of Spokane, Washington, has expressed “serious concerns” about an LGBT legal-advocacy clinic at Gonzaga University. The diocese said that Bishop Daly is “studying the issue further” and plans to speak with university administrators about the clinic.

Historically today is the feast of St. Conrad of Piacenza, a friar and hermit celebrated for piety and miraculous cures at Noto in Sicily and St. Gabinus, brother of Pope St. Caius, father of St. Susanna, who was ordained in his old age.

According to the 1962 Missal of St. John XXIII the Extraordinary Form of the Roman Rite, today is the feast of St. Simeon, bishop and martyr. He was successor to the apostle St. James in the See of Jerusalem and was arrested and probably crucified in about A.D. 110, under the emperor Trajan. He ruled over the Church of Jerusalem for forty years.

Today the liturgy honors seven noble Florentines who in the thirteenth century, at a time when Florence and all Italy was torn by civil strife, banded together to found, not far from Florence on Monte Senario, the Order of Servites of the Blessed Virgin Mary, especially dedicated to penance and meditation on the sorrows of our Lady in the passion of our Savior. This order was approved by the Holy See in 1304. One of the seven, Alexis Falconieri, died on this date in 1310. According to the 1962 Missal of St. John XXIII the Extraordinary Form of the Roman Rite this feast is celebrated on February 12.

Jesus said to his disciples: "Do not think that I have come to abolish the law or the prophets. I have come not to abolish but to fulfill. Amen, I say to you, until heaven and earth pass away, not the smallest letter or the smallest part of a letter will pass from the law, until all things have taken place.

The Jesuit Priest St. Claude de la Colombière was the first to believe in the mystical revelations of the Sacred Heart given to St. Margaret Mary in Paray le Monial Convent, France. Thanks to his support, St. Margaret Mary's superior also believed, and propagation of the devotion to the Sacred heart was started.

St. Cyril was a priest and a philosopher and accompanied his brother St. Methodius to Moravia to preach the Gospel. They both perfected a Slavonic alphabet which is now known as the Cyrillic alphabet and translated the liturgy into this language. They were summoned to Rome, where Cyril died on this date in 869, and Methodius was consecrated bishop and sent to Pannonia. He died on April 6, 885, in Velehrad, Czech Republic, after working tirelessly on spreading the Gospel. According to the 1962 Missal of Bl. John XXIII the Extraordinary Form of the Roman Rite, their feast is celebrated on July 7.

Historically today is the feast of St. Catherine de Ricci a native of Florence, Italy, who became a Dominican tertiary in 1535 and eventually filled the offices of novice-mistress and prioress. She was famous for her ecstasies in which she beheld and enacted the scenes of our Lord's passion. It is said that she met St. Philip Neri, in a vision who was still alive in Rome. Three future popes were among the thousands who flocked to her convent to ask her prayers.

According to the 1962 Missal of St. John XXIII the Extraordinary Form of the Roman Rite, today is the feast of Seven Founders of the Servite Order. Their feast in the Ordinary Form of the Roman Rite is celebrated on February 17th. Historically today is the feast of St. Eulalia the most celebrated virgin martyr of Spain. She was a native of Merida, thirteen years of age, and was burnt at the stake in her native city under Diocletian.