Today and yesterday, we hear readings from the 13th chapter of Acts, in which Paul is in Antioch, addressing the people in the synagogue about Christ’s Good News. For Paul and his companions, their faith in Jesus, Jesus’ proclamation of God’s kingdom, and his death and resurrection, influence their work of Evangelization and their new life in the Gospel message. Every Easter season, as we hear the story of the founding of the Early Church and the way in which they lived out their faith, we are called to be inspired by their zeal and energy. Everyone remembers that the Second Vatican Council called us to modernize the Church and to read the signs of the times of the modern world. But the Council also called us to harken back to the traditions and teachings of the Early Church, to see our roots and our foundation as a community of believers in what they believed and in what they practiced.
Today, we also celebrate the feast day of Our Lady of Good Counsel, a wonderful story about Mary that takes place in Genazzano, Italy, where the Augustine friars had a monastery and where they ministered in the parish church of Our Lady of Good Counsel. As the Augustinian brothers were renovating the church in 1467, a marble figure of Mary was removed. At that site, there miraculously appeared an image of Mary and the child Jesus. That image took on the title of the parish church, Our Lady of the Good Counsel. According to an old tradition, that same icon was venerated in Albania under the name Our Lady of the Albanians. It is said that this image disappeared from a church as Albania after it was being invaded by infidels. Legend says that it was miraculously relocated by divine intervention to the church in Italy. This church became the site of pilgrimage. Pope John XXIII was a pilgrim to the shrine there on the eve of the Second Vatican Council, and Pope John Paul II visited it before going to Albania to re-establish the hierarchy there following the collapse of communism. Mary is known under the title of Mother of Good Counsel for the good advice she gave, especially at the wedding of Cana. Mary is blessed for not only being the Mother of our Lord, but also for being his first disciple. May we unite our prayers with Mary’s prayers today.
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