Feast of St. John, Apostle and Evangelist

Today is the feast of St. John, Apostle and Evangelist. He needs no introduction. Out of all the evangelists, he is my favorite.

Fr. Leonard Goffine (1648 - 1719), in his Devout Meditations, has the following summary of the Beloved Disciple:

John, the brother of St. James the Greater, was a son of Zebedee, a fisherman of Galilee, and of Salome, a cousin of the Blessed Virgin Mary (Matt. iv. 21). He was the youngest of the apostles, and with Peter and James, was the most trusted of the disciples of Jesus, by Whom he was tenderly loved, on which account he is called the Disciple of Love. Of this Jesus gave the most convincing evidence when, at the Last Supper, He allowed that disciple to lean upon His breast, and when, from the cross, He committed to the care of John His own Mother. After the ascension John preached the Gospel in Palestine; afterwards went to Asia Minor, fixed his residence in Ephesus, and established many churches there. He was, with the other apostles, taken prisoner and scourged by the Jews, and in the year 95, under the Emperor Domitian, before the Latin Gate, at Rome, was thrown into a vessel of boiling oil. Having endured this torture without injury, he was then banished to the island of Patmos, where, by command of the Lord, he wrote the Apocalypse, or Revelation, concerning the fortunes of the Church. On returning from his banishment, he again governed the churches of Asia Minor as chief pastor, as he had done before, and, at the age of nearly one hundred years, died at Ephesus a peaceful and natural death.

Fr. Goffine also has the following to say about St. John and purity:

'He that loves wisdom,' saith the Holy Ghost, 'will obtain it, for it will not enter into a malicious soul, nor dwell in a body subject to sins' (Wis. i. 4). St. John was from his childhood an angel of purity, on which account he was particularly beloved by Jesus, and endowed by the Holy Ghost with such wisdom and knowledge that, as St. Augustine has remarked, he begin his gospel in a manner more lofty and sublime than the other three evangelists. For while they walk with the God-man upon earth, speaking comparatively little of His divinity, St. John, as if despising the world, soars beyond the vault of heaven, above the host of angels, and comes to Him by Whom all things are made, saying, "In the beginning was the Word." At the Last Supper he was permitted to lean on the bosom of Jesus, but what he there drank in secretly he imparted openly. Apply thyself, therefore, to purity of heart, and thou shalt be like St. John, a beloved disciple of Jesus, and shalt be filled with heavenly wisdom.

Ora pro nobis, Sante Johannes!