The Holy Martyr Basiliscus.
Abstention from meat and foods that contain these ingredients.
Acts 27:1-44; John 17:18-26.
Read Acts 27:1-44
The old Romans had a god for the sea, which is to say they had a name for their uncertainty. They called him Neptune. He was splendid, stormy, bearded, and utterly unreliable. A man could pour wine into the waves, flatter the blue monster with prayers, and still be swallowed before supper. Neptune was mercurial because the pagan gods were often only the passions of nature wearing crowns.
Then comes Saint Paul, chained on a ship bound for his eventual condemnation in Rome, yet free and on the cusp of vindication.
The sailors know the sea. The soldiers know command. The merchants know cargo. Everyone knows something, and yet nobody knows how to save the ship. The wind rises. The sky disappears. The vessel is driven like a leaf across the waters. The whole proud machinery of empire is reduced to wet ropes, broken boards, and frightened men.
Then Paul stands up.
He does not say, “There is no storm.” The apostolic preaching is not optimism for fools. Notice how St. Paul does not even say, “The ship will be spared.” He says the ship will be lost, but the lives will be saved, because the merciful Christ has spoken through His angel: “Do not be afraid.”
Here is the difference between Neptune and Christ. Neptune is the storm with a mask. Christ is the Lord who walks upon the storm. Neptune must be appeased. Christ gives Himself. Neptune may drown the sailor. Christ beckons us to walk on the waves with him and to arrive in the harbor.
And this is the mystery of the Church. The Church on earth is that battered ship, creaking through history, struck by winds from every side. Seemingly defeated by human account. But she is not alone upon the waters. The Church in heaven sails with her. The Mother of God, the angles, the apostles, the martyrs, the confessors, the unknown saints whose names are written only in paradise: they lean over the battlements of glory and help us home by their prayers.
Heaven is not a distant shore watching us sink. Heaven is often the blessed company of those blowing us toward the home port.
So stay in the ship. Stay with Christ. Stay with His mystical Church. The visible mast may crack and the tangible bow and stern break. The waves may rise. The world may laugh. But the mercurial sea is not master of the voyage.
The merciful Christ is.
And He will bring you and me safely into harbor, as he once did for St. Paul.