Today, in his daily Lentcast, Father John Zuhlsdorf mentioned a small detail that gives me another opportunity to marvel at how cool it is to be a Catholic.

In the Breviary today, the Church gives us part of a sermon (reproduced below) of Saint Augustine on the Gospel we hear at Mass today. In the Gospel, Saint Augustine is explaining the meaning of the mystery of the Lord's choice of the one sick man who had been lying infirm for 38 years. His interpretative style is marvelous! (I encourage you to read it below.) But, the really cool detail is that in this Gospel chosen for Ember Friday in Lent, 38 is also the number of days that remain in Lent! Now, if that's not cool enough, think about this: the Gospel connected to this Mass was chosen because of Ember Friday and because of Lent not because of Augustine. And, the inclusion of Saint Augustine's sermon in the Breviary has to do with the fact of the Gospel, not the 38. And yet, this very sermon teaches the mystery of the 38 on the very day on which there remain 38 days! So cool!

So, let us heed the lesson of Bishop Augustine and fear lest our Lenten fasts and penances be in vain for lacking the 2-fold commandment of charity (to God and neighbor) and so come up short of the fullness or perfection (40).

Sermon of St. Augustine, Bishop of Hippo
17th Tract on the Gospel according to Saint John

Let us see what is mystically signified by that one infirm man whom alone the Lord, keeping to a mysterious unity, chose out of so many sufferers, to be the subject of His healing power. He found in him a certain number of years of sickness. He had had an infirmity thirty and eight years. How this number is proper rather to weakness than to health, will now be the subject of a few careful remarks. I bespeak your attention; the Lord will be present, that I may speak fitly, and you may understand. The number forty is put before us as hallowed, and, in a way, perfect. I think that your love knoweth this God's Scriptures often and; often witness it. Ye well know that a Fast of this number of days is hallowed. Moses fasted forty days. Elias did the same. And our Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ Himself fasted this number of days complete. Moses representeth the Law, Elias the Prophets, and the Lord the Gospel. And therefore these three appeared on the Mount of the Transfiguration. There the Lord showed Himself to His disciples with His Face shining as the sun, and His raiment glistering; and He stood between Moses and Elias; as it were, the Gospel receiving testimony, on the one hand from the Law, and, on the other, from the Prophets. Whether, therefore, it be in the Law, or in the Prophets, or in the Gospel, the number of forty is recommended to us for Fast-days. The great and general Fast is this to abstain from the iniquity of the world, and her forbidden pleasures. This is the perfect Fast, that, denying ungodliness, and worldly lusts, we should live soberly, righteously, and godly in this present world. After such a Fast, what is the Feast that followeth? Hear what the Apostle saith in continuation Looking for that blessed hope, and the glorious appearing of our great God and Saviour Jesus Christ. Titus ii. 12, 13. We, then, make our pilgrimage in this world a Lent, by living good lives, and abstaining from her iniquities and her forbidden pleasures. But at the end of this life-long Lent there will be an Easter indeed. We look for that blessed hope, and the glorious appearing of our great God and Saviour Jesus Christ When that hope is realised, when that faith is swallowed up in knowledge, then indeed shall we receive every man a penny. In good sooth, it is true that every labourer in the vineyard will get his wages witness that Gospel which I believe ye have not forgotten, Matth. xx. 116 and which it is not my business to quote again as if ye were ignorant children. Now, the word used in the original for this penny which the labourers received is denarion. And the derivation of the word denarion is the numeral decem, ten. There are forty days in Lent, and if we add ten, we get fifty. So do we toil in fasting for the forty days of Lent before Easter, and, then, when we have, as it were, received our reward, we keep holiday for the fifty days of Eastertide. Remember how I remarked, that the man healed by our Lord at the pool of Bethesda had had an infirmity thirty and eight years. I wish to explain why this number of thirty-eight is proper rather to weakness than to health. Love is the fulfilling of the law Rom. xiii. 10; to the fulfilling of the law belongeth in every work the number forty. But in love we have given us two precepts Thou shalt love the Lord thy God with all thy heart, and with all thy soul, and with all thy mind. This is the first and great commandment. And the second is like unto it Thou shalt love thy neighbour as thyself. On these two commandments hang all the law and the prophets. Matth. xxii. 37-40. When the widow gave all she had for an offering to God she gave two mites Mark xii. 42; the inn-keeper received two pence wherewith to cure him that had fallen among thieves Luke x. 35; Jesus abode for two days among the Samaritans John iv. 40, that He might establish them in love. When, then, anything good is spoken of as two, the two great divisions of love are the chief mystic interpretation. If, then, the law is fulfilled in the number forty, and it is not fulfilled if there be lacking the two precepts of love, what wonder is it that he was infirm who lacked two of forty?

-Fr. D.B. Thompson