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Treasures of Our Faith with Deacon Richard Vehige

On Friday of the Twenty-First Week in Ordinary Time our Church invites us to reflect on a passage from the book of the prophet Jerimiah (4: 5-8, 13-28) entitled “The destroying enemy from the North”. Our treasure, which follows, is from a commentary on Joel by Saint Jerome, priest.

Saint Jerome was born at Stridon in Dalmatia around the year 340. He studied the classical authors at Rome, and was baptized there. He embraced a life of a statism, and went to the East where he was ordained a priest. Returning to Rome, he became a secretary to Pope Damascus. At Rome, he began to translate the holy scriptures into Latin and to promote the monastic life. Eventually he settled in Bethlehem where he served the needs of the Church. He wrote many works, especially commentaries on holy Scripture. He died at Bethlehem in 420.

Jerome’s commentary on Joel teaches about the power of combined prayers and fasting of God’s people during a time of great difficulty in Israel’s history. Joel assured the people that through repentance they would again receive the blessings of God.

The Book of Jeremiah combines history, biography, and prophecy. It portrays a nation in crisis and introduces the reader to an extraordinary person whom the Lord called to prophesy under the trying circumstances of the final days of the kingdom of Judah. Jeremiah was born, perhaps about 650 B.C., of a priestly family from the village of Anathoth, two and a half miles northeast of Jerusalem. He was called to his task in the thirteenth year of King Josiah. Josiah’s reform, begun with enthusiasm and hope, ended with his death on the battlefield of Megiddo (609 B.C.) as he attempted to stop the northward march of the Egyptian Pharaoh Neco, who was going to provide assistance to the Assyrians who were in retreat before the Babylonians. Nineveh, the capital of Assyria, fell in 612 B.C., preparing the way for the new colossus, Babylon, which was soon to put an end to the independence of Judah.