{"ok":true,"date":"2026-02-13","dateKey":"02-13","liturgicalDay":"Feria of Septuagesima","rank":"Feria","color":"violet","quoteOfTheDay":{"text":"Moreover, in the Catholic Church itself, all possible care must be taken, that we hold that faith which has been believed everywhere, always, by all.","author":"St. Vincent of Lérins","source":"Commonitory, Chapter 2, §6","treasuryHref":"/wisdom#the-vincentian-canon","category":"Truth: Christ and His Church"},"season":"Septuagesima","novenas":[{"title":"Novena to the Holy Face","feast":"Holy Face of Jesus","day":6,"totalDays":9,"startIsoDate":"2026-02-08","feastIsoDate":"2026-02-17","dayTitle":null,"meditation":null,"intention":"Ask for reparation, reverence, hatred of blasphemy, and love for the suffering Face of Christ before Lent begins.","preparatoryPrayer":null,"prayerOfTheChurch":null,"prayer":null,"practice":"Offer the day's prayers, sacrifices, and duties in reparation for blasphemy, irreverence, false worship, and sins against the first three commandments.","conclusion":null,"prayerLink":null,"sources":[]}],"octaveContexts":[],"subject":"City of God in Exile: Feria of Septuagesima - 2026-02-13","previewText":"Feria of Septuagesima. Valid Sacraments Are a Grave Priority. Resist home-alone despair when it becomes settled indifference to seeking valid sacraments.","plainText":"CITY OF GOD IN EXILE\nTHE DAILY PILGRIMAGE\n\"Now therefore, ye children, hear me: Blessed are they that keep my ways.\" - Proverbs 8:32\n\"Fear not, little flock, for it hath pleased your Father to give you a kingdom. [...] For where your treasure is, there will your heart be also.\" - Luke 12:32-34\nFeria of Septuagesima\n2026-02-13 - Septuagesima - Feria - violet\nPLAIN-LANGUAGE GUIDE FOR TODAY\nSeptuagesima: the first Sunday of the traditional pre-Lenten season; it begins the Church's gradual preparation for the fasting and penance of Lent.\nFeria: a weekday without a higher feast of its own; its prayers usually follow the current liturgical season.\nSupernatural: arising from God's grace and directed toward eternal life, above what unaided human nature can produce.\nTODAY IN THE ROMAN YEAR\nThe Church does not leave the faithful to pass through time as though days were neutral. This observance teaches the soul to receive the day under grace, to remember what God has done, and to let sacred time order study, prayer, and perseverance. Choose Our Lady freely as Queen and Mistress, offering the loving will beneath the sovereignty God has granted her by grace. Choose Our Lady freely as Queen and Mistress under Christ, placing the entire loving will beneath her maternal formation.\n\n\"Is it not reasonable that amongst so many slaves of constraint, there should be some of love, who of their own good will, in the quality of slaves, should choose Mary for their mistress?\"\nSt. Louis-Marie de Montfort, True Devotion to the Blessed Virgin, no. 76\n\nSt. Louis de Montfort contrasts constraint with love. Our Lady's universal queenship exists by God's gift; the devout soul recognizes it willingly and gives her the heart. This voluntary spiritual belonging never authorizes coercion, passivity before abuse, or obedience to any sinful human command. It is the free response of charity to God's order.\n\nChoose her governance concretely. Let her Magnificat govern praise, her fiat govern decisions, her purity govern senses, her pondering govern memory, her flight into Egypt govern prudence, her presence at Cana govern intercession, and her station beneath the Cross govern perseverance. A loving subject imitates the Queen.\n\nPRACTICE\nThank God for natural goods and order their use to grace and truth.\n\nQUOTE OF THE DAY\n\"Moreover, in the Catholic Church itself, all possible care must be taken, that we hold that faith which has been believed everywhere, always, by all.\"\nSt. Vincent of Lérins, Commonitory, Chapter 2, §6\n\nNOVENA IN PROGRESS\nNovena to the Holy Face - Day 6 of 9\n\nPreparing for Holy Face of Jesus on 2026-02-17.\n\nPETITION\nAsk for reparation, reverence, hatred of blasphemy, and love for the suffering Face of Christ before Lent begins.\n\nA FAITHFUL ACT\nOffer the day's prayers, sacrifices, and duties in reparation for blasphemy, irreverence, false worship, and sins against the first three commandments.\nROMAN MARTYROLOGY - February 13\nAt Antioch, the holy prophet Agabus, of whom mention is made by St. Luke, in the Acts of the Apostles. — At Ravenna, in the time of the emperor Decius, and the governor Quinctian, the Saints Fusca, virgin, and her nurse, Maura, who endured many afflictions, were transpierced with a sword, and thus ended their martyrdom. — At Meletine, in Armenia, in the persecution of the same Decius, St. Polyeuctus, martyr, who, after many sufferings, obtained the crown of martyrdom. — At Lyons, St. Julian, martyr. — At Todi, St. Benignus, martyr. — At Rome, pope St. Gregory II., who strenuously opposed the impiety of Leo the Isaurian, and sent St. Boniface to preach the Gospel in Germany. — At Angers, the demise of the holy bishop Lucinius, a man venerable for his sanctity. — At Lyons, St. Stephen, bishop and confessor. — At Kieti, the abbot St. Stephen, a man of wonderful patience, at whose death, as is related by the blessed pope Gregory, the holy angels were present and visible to all. — At Prato, in Tuscany, St. Catharine de Ricci, a Florentine virgin, of the Order of St. Dominic, replenished with heavenly gifts, whom pope Benedict XIV. inscribed on the catalogue of holy virgins. She died rich in virtues and merits on the 2d of this month, but her festival is celebrated on this day.\n\nTHE PILGRIM'S SPIRITUAL CONFERENCE\nValid Sacraments Are a Grave Priority\nThe Church places this truth before you today: The faithful must seek valid sacraments with prudence, sacrifice, and holy seriousness, without inventing sacraments or despising them. Do not hurry past it as though doctrine belonged only to books and controversies. A revealed truth is also a light by which the soul must judge its loyalties, its fears, its habits, and the duties immediately before it. Families often move for work, schools, or safety. The sacraments are a higher good, and should weigh heavily in practical decisions when God makes such a move possible.\nThe grace to be practiced is Faithful obedience to the grace of the present day, drawn from the daily rule of fidelity. Ask God for more than the natural appearance of this virtue. Temperament may make an action seem easy for a time, but supernatural virtue remains faithful because God is worthy of obedience, even when feeling offers no assistance and no one notices the cost. Practice willing submission by imitating Mary's virtues across every decision, duty, temptation, relationship, sorrow, and act of worship.\nThere is also an enemy to recognize: Resist home-alone despair when it becomes settled indifference to seeking valid sacraments. Do not study this danger only in other people. Look quietly for the door by which it seeks entrance into your own soul - perhaps through delay, curiosity, resentment, human respect, attachment to comfort, or the desire to control the outcome. Dying to self today means choosing faithful obedience to the grace of the present day when pride, comfort, fear, resentment, or human respect asks for control.\nDo the faithful act and entrust its fruit to divine Providence, God's wise and loving governance of all things. Place effort and outcome into Our Lady's hands so that the whole offering may be presented to her Divine Son. Confidence in God is not passivity: obey, pray, work, and accept that visible success, consolation, or immediate relief may not be given. God remains faithful when the duty is hidden and the outcome uncertain. Therefore, perform the duty that belongs to you, use the lawful means God has provided, and then surrender the fruit. Surrender the proud demand to remain self-governing while preserving all duties, prudence, and rightful resistance to sin or abuse. Let Our Lady's dispositions govern the full day and direct every act toward the honor and service of Jesus Christ.\nThe Church's witness: this truth manifests the Church's mark of holy; the witness placed beside it is St. Charles Borromeo.\nYour resolution before God: Thank God for natural goods and order their use to grace and truth.\nCarry this word: Natural kindness is not the same as supernatural fidelity.\nTHE PILGRIM'S MIRROR\n\"Learn now to die to the world, that thou mayest then live with Christ.\"\nThomas à Kempis, The Imitation of Christ, Book I, chapter 23, p. 41\nChristian death to self is not despair but preparation for life with Christ. Refuse the command of every attachment that draws you from God's will, beginning with the strongest.\n\nThe world tells you to preserve every comfort and construct an identity from passing things. Christ teaches you to travel lightly toward eternity. You need not despise God's gifts; receive them gratefully, but practice being able to surrender them when His will, charity, or duty requires it.\nToday's Practice: Accept unnoticed sacrifices without seeking relief or recognition.\nDAILY EXAMEN\nExamine whether you chose her maternal rule in conduct or honored her verbally while allowing appetite and self-will to reign.\n- For what grace or mercy should I thank God today?\n- What sin, fault, neglected duty, or resistance to grace must I confess?\n- What definite amendment will I carry into tomorrow?\nPRAYER\nO Lord, bless every natural good, but do not let me confuse it with the life of grace. Draw my family, my work, and my affections beneath the Catholic Faith.\nDAILY RULE FOR THE PILGRIM\nA brief rule to keep every day:\nBegin with morning prayer\nAdore the Blessed Trinity and offer the whole day to Jesus through Mary before other duties claim the mind.\nKeep the Angelus\nPause morning, noon, and evening to remember the Incarnation.\nSeek Our Lord in the Blessed Sacrament\nAttend Holy Mass when duty permits; otherwise make a Spiritual Communion and renew desire for Jesus in the Blessed Sacrament.\nReturn to Jesus and Mary\nUse frequent holy aspirations during work, waiting, suffering, and temptation.\nPray the Rosary\nKeep the mysteries of Christ before the mind with Our Lady and learn to imitate what they contain.\nEnd with night prayer and examen\nGive thanks, confess faults, forgive injuries, make a practical amendment, and entrust the night to Our Lady.\nCONTINUE STUDY\nHow to Judge a Traditionalist Chapel: https://cityofgodinexile.com/the-counterfeit/how-to-judge-a-traditionalist-chapel?entered=1\nOpen this day in the Sacred Calendar: https://cityofgodinexile.com/sacred-calendar?date=2026-02-13&entered=1\nOpen this day's Daily Pilgrimage: https://cityofgodinexile.com/daily-dispatch?date=2026-02-13&entered=1\nBrowse the Formation Index: https://cityofgodinexile.com/daily-dispatch/formation?entered=1","html":"\n\n \n \n \n City of God in Exile: Feria of Septuagesima - 2026-02-13\n \n \n
\n Feria of Septuagesima. Valid Sacraments Are a Grave Priority. Resist home-alone despair when it becomes settled indifference to seeking valid sacraments.\n
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\n \"City\n
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City of God in Exile

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“Now therefore, ye children, hear me: Blessed are they that keep my ways.”

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Proverbs 8:32

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Feria of Septuagesima

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2026-02-13 - Septuagesima - Feria - violet

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“Fear not, little flock, for it hath pleased your Father to give you a kingdom. […] For where your treasure is, there will your heart be also.”
Luke 12:32–34
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Plain-Language Guide for Today

\n
\n
Septuagesima
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the first Sunday of the traditional pre-Lenten season; it begins the Church's gradual preparation for the fasting and penance of Lent.
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Feria
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a weekday without a higher feast of its own; its prayers usually follow the current liturgical season.
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Supernatural
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arising from God's grace and directed toward eternal life, above what unaided human nature can produce.
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Today in the Roman Year

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The Church does not leave the faithful to pass through time as though days were neutral. This observance teaches the soul to receive the day under grace, to remember what God has done, and to let sacred time order study, prayer, and perseverance.

Choose Our Lady freely as Queen and Mistress, offering the loving will beneath the sovereignty God has granted her by grace.

Choose Our Lady freely as Queen and Mistress under Christ, placing the entire loving will beneath her maternal formation.

“Is it not reasonable that amongst so many slaves of constraint, there should be some of love, who of their own good will, in the quality of slaves, should choose Mary for their mistress?”

St. Louis-Marie de Montfort, True Devotion to the Blessed Virgin, no. 76

St. Louis de Montfort contrasts constraint with love. Our Lady's universal queenship exists by God's gift; the devout soul recognizes it willingly and gives her the heart. This voluntary spiritual belonging never authorizes coercion, passivity before abuse, or obedience to any sinful human command. It is the free response of charity to God's order.

Choose her governance concretely. Let her Magnificat govern praise, her fiat govern decisions, her purity govern senses, her pondering govern memory, her flight into Egypt govern prudence, her presence at Cana govern intercession, and her station beneath the Cross govern perseverance. A loving subject imitates the Queen.

Thank God for natural goods and order their use to grace and truth.

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Quote of the Day

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“Moreover, in the Catholic Church itself, all possible care must be taken, that we hold that faith which has been believed everywhere, always, by all.”
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St. Vincent of Lérins, Commonitory, Chapter 2, §6

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Novena in Progress

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Day 6 of 9

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Novena to the Holy Face

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Preparing for Holy Face of Jesus on 2026-02-17.

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Petition

Ask for reparation, reverence, hatred of blasphemy, and love for the suffering Face of Christ before Lent begins.

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A Faithful Act

Offer the day's prayers, sacrifices, and duties in reparation for blasphemy, irreverence, false worship, and sins against the first three commandments.

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Roman Martyrology - February 13

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At Antioch, the holy prophet Agabus, of whom mention is made by St. Luke, in the Acts of the Apostles. — At Ravenna, in the time of the emperor Decius, and the governor Quinctian, the Saints Fusca, virgin, and her nurse, Maura, who endured many afflictions, were transpierced with a sword, and thus ended their martyrdom. — At Meletine, in Armenia, in the persecution of the same Decius, St. Polyeuctus, martyr, who, after many sufferings, obtained the crown of martyrdom. — At Lyons, St. Julian, martyr. — At Todi, St. Benignus, martyr. — At Rome, pope St. Gregory II., who strenuously opposed the impiety of Leo the Isaurian, and sent St. Boniface to preach the Gospel in Germany. — At Angers, the demise of the holy bishop Lucinius, a man venerable for his sanctity. — At Lyons, St. Stephen, bishop and confessor. — At Kieti, the abbot St. Stephen, a man of wonderful patience, at whose death, as is related by the blessed pope Gregory, the holy angels were present and visible to all. — At Prato, in Tuscany, St. Catharine de Ricci, a Florentine virgin, of the Order of St. Dominic, replenished with heavenly gifts, whom pope Benedict XIV. inscribed on the catalogue of holy virgins. She died rich in virtues and merits on the 2d of this month, but her festival is celebrated on this day.

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The Pilgrim's Spiritual Conference

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Valid Sacraments Are a Grave Priority

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The Church places this truth before you today: The faithful must seek valid sacraments with prudence, sacrifice, and holy seriousness, without inventing sacraments or despising them. Do not hurry past it as though doctrine belonged only to books and controversies. A revealed truth is also a light by which the soul must judge its loyalties, its fears, its habits, and the duties immediately before it. Families often move for work, schools, or safety. The sacraments are a higher good, and should weigh heavily in practical decisions when God makes such a move possible.

The grace to be practiced is Faithful obedience to the grace of the present day, drawn from the daily rule of fidelity. Ask God for more than the natural appearance of this virtue. Temperament may make an action seem easy for a time, but supernatural virtue remains faithful because God is worthy of obedience, even when feeling offers no assistance and no one notices the cost. Practice willing submission by imitating Mary's virtues across every decision, duty, temptation, relationship, sorrow, and act of worship.

There is also an enemy to recognize: Resist home-alone despair when it becomes settled indifference to seeking valid sacraments. Do not study this danger only in other people. Look quietly for the door by which it seeks entrance into your own soul - perhaps through delay, curiosity, resentment, human respect, attachment to comfort, or the desire to control the outcome. Dying to self today means choosing faithful obedience to the grace of the present day when pride, comfort, fear, resentment, or human respect asks for control.

Do the faithful act and entrust its fruit to divine Providence, God's wise and loving governance of all things. Place effort and outcome into Our Lady's hands so that the whole offering may be presented to her Divine Son. Confidence in God is not passivity: obey, pray, work, and accept that visible success, consolation, or immediate relief may not be given. God remains faithful when the duty is hidden and the outcome uncertain. Therefore, perform the duty that belongs to you, use the lawful means God has provided, and then surrender the fruit. Surrender the proud demand to remain self-governing while preserving all duties, prudence, and rightful resistance to sin or abuse. Let Our Lady's dispositions govern the full day and direct every act toward the honor and service of Jesus Christ.

\n

The Church's witness: this truth manifests the Church's mark of holy; the witness placed beside it is St. Charles Borromeo.

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Your Resolution Before God

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Thank God for natural goods and order their use to grace and truth.

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Natural kindness is not the same as supernatural fidelity.
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The Pilgrim's Mirror

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How shall I imitate Christ today?

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“Learn now to die to the world, that thou mayest then live with Christ.”
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Thomas à Kempis, The Imitation of Christ, Book I, chapter 23, p. 41

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Christian death to self is not despair but preparation for life with Christ. Refuse the command of every attachment that draws you from God's will, beginning with the strongest.

The world tells you to preserve every comfort and construct an identity from passing things. Christ teaches you to travel lightly toward eternity. You need not despise God's gifts; receive them gratefully, but practice being able to surrender them when His will, charity, or duty requires it.

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Today's Practice

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Accept unnoticed sacrifices without seeking relief or recognition.

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Daily Examen

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Three questions before night prayer

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Examine whether you chose her maternal rule in conduct or honored her verbally while allowing appetite and self-will to reign.

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  • For what grace or mercy should I thank God today?
  • What sin, fault, neglected duty, or resistance to grace must I confess?
  • What definite amendment will I carry into tomorrow?
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Prayer

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O Lord, bless every natural good, but do not let me confuse it with the life of grace. Draw my family, my work, and my affections beneath the Catholic Faith.

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Daily Rule for the Pilgrim

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A brief rule to keep every day:

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Begin with morning prayer

Adore the Blessed Trinity and offer the whole day to Jesus through Mary before other duties claim the mind.

Keep the Angelus

Pause morning, noon, and evening to remember the Incarnation.

Seek Our Lord in the Blessed Sacrament

Attend Holy Mass when duty permits; otherwise make a Spiritual Communion and renew desire for Jesus in the Blessed Sacrament.

Return to Jesus and Mary

Use frequent holy aspirations during work, waiting, suffering, and temptation.

Pray the Rosary

Keep the mysteries of Christ before the mind with Our Lady and learn to imitate what they contain.

End with night prayer and examen

Give thanks, confess faults, forgive injuries, make a practical amendment, and entrust the night to Our Lady.

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Continue Study

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Carry today's lesson into a focused chapter from the library.

\n How to Judge a Traditionalist Chapel\n
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Persevere, pilgrim.

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The gates remain open to the faithful.

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\n \"The\n
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\n \n","links":{"sacredCalendar":"/sacred-calendar?date=2026-02-13","webPreview":"/daily-dispatch?date=2026-02-13","emailPreview":"/daily-dispatch/email?date=2026-02-13","formationIndex":"/daily-dispatch/formation","subscribe":"/daily-dispatch/subscribe"},"included":{"martyrology":true,"gospelReflection":false,"saintlyWitness":false,"breviaryReading":false,"patristicBreviaryLesson":false,"faithPoint":"Valid Sacraments Are a Grave Priority"}}