17th Sunday After Pentecost 2021
Today is also the feast of St. Januarius who was martyred in the fourth century.  A vial of his blood is preserved in Naples in a reliquary and on his feastday it often liquifies to show the saint’s protection of the city.  It did so today. On this day in 1846 the Blessed Mother appeared to a shepherdess and a young boy who were pasturing cattle on the side of a hill in the French Alps.  Our Lady explained how disregard of the second and third commandments by profaning her Son’s Holy Name and missing Mass and doing servile work on Sundays were the causes of the famines etc. that were punishing the people.  She gave the children prophecies of terrible future events if the world did not convert and do penance.
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