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1 Macc 2,15-29 The king’s commissioners who were enforcing the apostasy came to the town of Modein for the sacrifices. Many Israelites gathered round them, but Mattathias and his sons drew apart. The king’s commissioners then addressed Mattathias as follows, ‘You are a respected leader, a great man in this town; you have sons and […]

2 Macc 7, 1.20-31 It also happened that seven brothers were arrested with their mother. The king tried to force them to taste some pork, which the Law forbids, by torturing them with whips and scourges. But the mother was especially admirable and worthy of honourable remembrance, for she watched the death of seven sons

2 Macc 6, 18-31 Eleazar, one of the foremost teachers of the Law, a man already advanced in years and of most noble appearance, had his mouth forced open, to make him eat a piece of pork. But he, resolving to die with honour rather than to live disgraced, walked of his own accord to

I Macc 1, 10-15.41-43.54-57.62-63 From these there grew a wicked offshoot, Antiochus Epiphanes son of King Antiochus; once a hostage in Rome, he became king in the 107th year of the kingdom of the Greeks. It was then that there emerged from Israel a set of renegades who led many people astray. ‘Come,’ they said,

Lk 21, 5-19 When some were talking about the Temple, remarking how it was adorned with fine stonework and votive offerings, he said, All these things you are staring at now — the time will come when not a single stone will be left on another; everything will be destroyed.’And they put to him this question,

In the context of these reflections on attitudes that make us unfree and which we have to overcome with the help of God, or at least to deal with them in the right way, I refer to the important book by Dietrich von Hildebrand: “The transformation in Christ”. In addition to very good topics covered in

In the last reflection, I pointed out that, as soon as we have found that strong dynamic persons, leading us a false way, have a negative impact on us and that we cannot resist sufficiently, we should avoid dynamically superior persons. It should be pointed out once again that this is not a matter of

This is related to the theme of of human fear, which arises from a general weakness and excessive receptivity to impressions. On 7 and 8 November, we have already considered some aspects of human fear. Some people become internally dependent on others who are purely dynamically superior to them. They take on foreign views, not because

Spiritual view of vanity If one now looks with a spiritual view of people, who are strongly determined by vanity, one quickly perceives the specific non-freedom of these people. They are not oriented towards God, but towards themselves, and also make themselves easily dependent on the judgment of other people. St. Paul was obviously also

Vanity is a very widespread specific form of non-freedom, which is easily underestimated in its negative effect if we follow seriously the Lord. It has many forms, although it may also affect women in particular in terms of appearance. Perhaps one is inclined to look at a woman’s vanity and think it is more harmless,