Daybreak

Friday of the First Week of Lent Saint of the Day: St. Matilda; Tenth Century daughter of Count Dietrich of Westphalia and Reinhild of Denmark; married Henry the Fowler, son of Duke Otto of Saxony, in the year 909; he succeeded his father as Duke in the year 912 and in 919 succeeded King Conrad I to the German throne; she was noted for her piety and charitable works; she was widowed in 936; she was severely criticized by her sons Otto and Henry for what they considered her extravagant charities, so she resigned her inheritance to them, and retired to her country home; in 955, she built three convents and a monastery; she was left in charge of the kingdom when Otto went to Rome in 962 to be crowned Emperor (often regarded as the beginning of the Holy Roman Empire); she spent most of the declining years at the convent at Nordhausen she had built; she died at the monastery at Quedlinburg on March 14, 968 Office of Readings and Morning Prayer for 3/14/25 Gospel: Matthew 5:20-26