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Saint for Today - St Mary Magdalen

7/22/2014

Mary Magdalene, a woman in the city, which was a sinner, through love of the truth, washed away in her tears the defilement of her sins, and the words of the Truth are fulfilled which he spoke: Her sins, which are many, are forgiven; for she loved much. She who had remained chilly in sin, became fiery through love. When even his disciples went away again unto their own home, Mary still stood without at the sepulchre of Christ, weeping. She sought him whom her soul loved, but she found him not. She searched for him with tears; she yearned with strong desire for him who, she believed, had been taken away. And thus it befell her, that being the only one who had remained to seek him, she was the only one that saw him. It is the truth that the backbone of a good work is perseverance.

At first when she sought him, she found him not; she went on searching, and so it came to pass that she found him; and this was so, to the end that her longing might grow in earnestness, and so in its earnestness might find what it sought. Hence is it that the Bride in the Song of Songs saith as representing the Church: By night on my bed I sought him whom my soul loveth. We seek on our bed for him whom our soul loveth, when, having got some little rest in this world, we still sigh for the Presence of our Redeemer; but it is by night that we so seek him, for though our mind may be on the alert for him, yet still he is hidden from our eyes by the darkness that

But if we find not him whom our soul loveth, it remaineth that we should rise and go about the city, that is, by thought and questioning, go through the holy Church of the elect: seek him in the streets, and in the broad ways, that is, walk anxiously looking about us both in the narrow and the broad places, that if we can, we may find his footsteps there; for there are some even of those who live for the world, from whom something may be learnt to be imitated by a godly man. As we thus go wakefully about, the watchmen, that keep the city, find us; the holy Fathers, who are the watchmen of the bulwarks of the Church, come to meet our good endeavours, and to teach us either by their words or by their writings. And it needeth but a little to pass from them, but we find him whom our soul loveth: for albeit our Redeemer in lowliness became a man among men, yet by right of his Divine Nature, he is still above men.

The Basilica of La Madeleine, Vezelay, France

Commemoration of St Paul

6/30/2014

At that time: Jesus said unto his disciples: Behold, I send you forth as sheep in the midst of wolves.

Sermon by St. John Chrysostom

It is as though he said: Let not your heart be troubled, even though I send you forth as sheep in the midst of wolves, and bid you be harmless as doves; for even if I would, I could not now make things otherwise. Even if I could make it so that ye should not have to bear anything grievous, or be at the mercy of the wolves as are other sheep, but on the contrary, could make you more dreadful to the lions than the lions to you, nevertheless I would not do it. For thus must it needs be: and yourselves it will make more glorious; and my power it will wholly shew forth. For thus was it that afterwards the same Lord said unto Paul: My grace is sufficient for thee, for my strength is made perfect in weakness. That is to say, It is I that have made you to be what ye are.

But let us look what wisdom it is which the Lord requireth. It is the wisdom of the serpent. The serpent draweth all the rest of his body after his head, and it is no matter to him if his body be cut through, so long as he keepeth his head unharmed. Thus, O Christian, is it with thee. It is no matter to thee that for thy Faith's sake thou shouldest lose all things else―money, or body, or, if need be, life itself. Thy Faith is thy head, and the root of thy being; hold fast to that, and, as long as thou hast that, although thou shouldest lose all things else, it will only be to receive them back again with interest an hundredfold. And thus it is that the Lord biddeth us, not to be single-hearted only, nor wise only, but both together, that therefrom we may be strong.

If thou wilt see how these words were brought to the proof in very deed, read the Book of the Acts of the Apostles. There thou wilt see how that oftentimes the Jewish people rose up against the Apostles, and gnashed on them with their teeth. But they, with dove-like guilelessness, gave them smooth answers, and turned away their wrath, and quenched their fury, and stopped their onset. When the Jews said: did not we straitly command you, that ye should not teach in this Name? although the Apostles could have worked any miracles they chose, yet they neither said nor did anything sharp, but answered them with all meekness: Whether it be right in the sight of God to hearken unto you more than unto God, judge ye. Here thou hast the harmlessness of doves; listen now to the wisdom of serpents: We cannot but speak the things which we have seen and heard.

Feast of Sts Peter and Paul

6/29/2014

The Lesson is taken from a Sermon by St. Leo the Pope

Dearly beloved, in the joy of each and every holy feast the whole world may have a share. For there is but one love of God, and whatsoever is solemnly called to memory, if it hath been done for the salvation of all, must needs be worth the honour of a joyful memorial at the hands of all. Nevertheless, this feast which we are keeping today, besides that world-wide worship which it doth of right get throughout all the earth, deserveth from this our City of Rome an outburst of gladness altogether special and our own. For in this place it was that the two chiefest of the Apostles did so right gloriously finish their race. And upon this day whereon they lifted up that their last testimony, let it be that the memory thereof receiveth in this place the chiefest of all its jubilant celebrations. O Rome! these twain are the men who brought the light of the Gospel of Christ to shine upon thee! These are they by whom thou, from being the teacher of lies, wast turned into a learner of the truth.

These twain are thy fathers; they truly are thy shepherds! These twain are they who laid foundations for thee (that thou mightest upbuild the kingdom of heaven) better and happier than did the Romulus (from whom thou art named), when he first planned thine earthly ramparts; which same he polluted with his brother's blood. These twain are they who have set on thine head this day thy glorious crown, so that thou art become an holy nation, a chosen people, a city both priestly and kingly, whom the sacred throne of blessed Peter hath exalted till thou art become the Lady of the world, unto whom the world-wide love for God hath conceded a broader lordship than is the possession of any mere earthly empire. Thou wast once waxen great by victories until thy power was spread haughtily over land sea, but thy power was narrower then, which the toils of war had won for thee, than that thou now hast which hath been laid at thy feet by the peace of Christ.

It was convenient for the doing of the work which God had decreed, that the whole multitude of kingdoms should be bound together under one rule, and that so the universal preaching of the Gospel should find easier entry unto all people, since all were governed by the empire of one city. But this City, knowing not him who had been pleased to make her great, used her lordship over almost all nations to make herself the minister of all their falsehoods; and seemed to herself exceedingly godly because there was no false god whom she rejected. But the tighter that Satan had bound her, the more wondrous was the work of Christ in setting her free.

Saint for Today - St Irenaeus

6/28/2014

Irenaeus was born in proconsular Asia, not far from the city of Smyrna. There he had already as a boy entrusted himself to the teaching of Polycarp, disciple of John the Evangelist, and bishop of Smyrna. Under such an excellent master, he made remarkable progress in learning and in the precepts of the Christian religion. When Polycarp was taken up to heaven by a glorious martyrdom, although Irenaeus was eminently versed in sacred letters, nevertheless, he burned with an incredible zeal to learn what articles of belief the others who were instructed by the Apostles had received, to be preserved in the deposit of faith. For this reason he brought together as many of those men as he could, and whatever things he heard from them, he carefully retained in his mind. Thus he could advantageously bring them to bear in the future against those heresies, which he saw were being diffused more widely day by day to the great detriment of the Christian people, and he diligently planned thoroughly to confute them. Then, having set out for Gaul, he was appointed as a priest of the church of Lyons by Pothinus the bishop. And this office he discharged in such a manner, labouring both by word and by teaching, that (according to the testimony of the holy Martyrs who, when Marcus Aurelius was emperor, were engaged in a vigorous combat for the true religion) he distinguished himself as an imitator of the testament of Christ.

These very Martyrs, together with the clergy of Lyons, began to be anxious concerning the peace of the churches of Asia, which the faction of the Montanists had disturbed. And so they selected Irenaeus, whose person they considered of the greatest importance, as the one before all others whom they should send to Rome to Pope Eleutherius to ask, that, with the condemnation of the new dissidents by the authority of the Apostolic See, the cause of the dissensions might be removed. Already the bishop Pothinus had died a martyr and Irenaeus succeeded him. He applied himself so well to the duties of a bishop, that in a short time he saw not only all the citizens of Lyons, but also many of the inhabitants of other cities in Gaul cast aside their superstitions and errors, and enroll themselves in the Christian army. Meanwhile, a dispute had arisen concerning the date of the celebration of Easter. As the bishops of Asia were disagreeing with nearly all their fellow-bishops, the Roman Pontiff Victor had cut them off from the communion of the faithful. Irenaeus, however, who was zealous for peace, admonished him in a becoming manner, and urged, by examples of the practice of previous Pontiffs, that he should not suffer so many Churches to be cut off from Catholic unity, on account of a rite which they said they had received from their ancestors.

He wrote many works, which are mentioned by Eusebius of Caesarea and by St. Jerome, a great part of which have perished through the ravages of time. There are extant five books of his against heresies, written down about the year 180, while Eleutherius was still ruling the Christian commonwealth. In the third book, the man of God, instructed by those who, it is certain, had been hearers of the Apostles, gives to the Roman Church and to the succession of her bishops a testimony surpassing all others in weight and brilliancy, when he calleth her the faithful, perpetual, and most assured guardian of divine tradition. For he said, that with this Church it is necessary that the whole Church (that is, those in all places who are of the faithful) should agree, because of its more powerful preeminence. At length with almost countless others, whom he had himself brought over to the true faith and its practice, being crowned with martyrdom he passed to heaven in the year of salvation 202. At that time Septimius Severus Augustus had commanded that all those who wished to remain constantly steadfast in the practice of the Christian religion should be condemned to the most cruel torments and to death. The supreme Pontiff Benedict XV extended the feast of St. Irenaeus to the universal Church.

Feast of the Sacred Heart

6/27/2014

At that time: The Jews, because it was the Preparation, that the bodies should not remain upon the cross on the Sabbath Day, for that Sabbath Day was an high day, besought Pilate that their legs might be broken, and that they might be taken away.

Sermon by St. Bonaventure the Bishop

In order that the Church might be taken out of the side of Christ, in his deep sleep on the Cross, and that the Scripture might be fulfilled which saith: They shall look on him whom they pierced: it was divinely ordained that one of the soldiers should pierce his sacred side with a spear, and open it. Then forthwith there came flowing out blood and water, which was the price of our salvation, pouring forth from its mountain-source, in sooth, from the secret places of his Heart, to give power to the Sacraments of the Church, to bestow the life of grace, and to be as a saving drink of living waters, flowing up to life eternal for those who were already quickened in Christ. Arise, then, O soul beloved of Christ. Cease not thy vigilance, place there thy lips, and drink the waters from the fount of salvation.

Because we are now come to the sweet Heart of Jesus, and because it is good for us to be here, let us not too soon turn away therefrom. O how good and joyful a thing it is to dwell in this Heart. What a good treasure, what a precious pearl, is thy Heart, O most excellent Jesu, which we have found hidden in the pit which hath been dug in this field, namely, in thy body. Who would cast away such a pearl? Nay, rather, for this same I would give all my pearls. I will sell all my thoughts and affections, and buy the same for myself, turning all my thoughts to the Heart of the good Jesus, and without fail it will support me. Therefore, o most sweet Jesu, finding this Heart that is thine and mine, I will pray to thee, my God: admit my prayers into the shrine of hearkening: and draw me even more altogether into thy Heart.

Thoughts for Feast of the Sacred Heart

6/27/2014

The Blessed Sacrament & The Sacred Heart

Today we celebrated the Feast of the Sacred Heart. Devotion to the Sacred Heart is based on the sublime doctrine of the Incarnation, which teaches us that the Son of God became man by uniting to Himself a human nature, so that He is one divine Person in two natures, the nature of God and the nature of man. Since, even in His human nature, He is a divine Person, his human nature and all its parts, when considered as united to His divine personality, is worthy of the highest type of adoration. Hence, the living, physical Heart of Jesus Christ, united to the Second Person of the Holy Trinity, can be adored as the Heart of God Himself.

The reason why we select the Heart of Our Lord for special veneration is that the human heart is a symbol of love. In our ordinary speech we refer to the heart as the source of a person's affection and devotion. Now, since Our Divine Lord has certainly shown His love for mankind in an extraordinary degree from the very beginning of His life until His death on the cross, we naturally desire to venerate His Heart by a special form of devotion. Such is the devotion of the Sacred Heart. The human Heart of Christ also reminds us of the eternal love which He, in union
with the Father and the Holy Ghost, has maintained for us from all eternity.

It is the wish of the Church that all her members foster a great love for the Sacred Heart. Besides instituting the Feast, which we celebrate annually on the Friday after the Octave of Corpus Christi, the Church has composed a beautiful Litany in honour of the Sacred Heart, together with an Act of Consecration for public devotions. Holy Communion on every First Friday in honour of the Sacred Heart is also an approved Catholic custom.

The devotion of the Sacred Heart is not precisely the same as the devotion to the Blessed Sacrament, but the two are closely connected. For, surely, one of the most striking manifestations of the love of Our Divine Redeemer for the human race was the institution of the Holy Eucharist. Hence, in adoring the Blessed Sacrament, we adore the Sacred Heart.

One of the objects of the devotion to the Sacred Heart is to make atonement to Our Lord for the many sins committed throughout the world. All sins are acts of ingratitude toward Christ, insofar as the sinner rejects the Blood that He shed for mankind. Included in such sins are acts of irreverence and profanation of the Blessed Sacrament.

Practical Application
Try to cultivate the habit of making short ejaculations in honour of the Sacred Heart, such as "Most Sacred Heart of Jesus, have mercy on us"... "Sacred Heart of Jesus, protect our families" which are richly indulgenced prayers.

Saints for Today - Sts John and Paul

6/26/2014

John and Paul were two Roman brethren, the godly and trustworthy servants of Constantia, daughter of Constantine. At her death they spent in feeding Christ's poor the property which she left them. Julian the Apostate asked them to enter his household, but they bravely answered that they would not be servants to one who had abandoned the service of Jesus Christ. Julian gave them ten days to consider on their choice, whether, at the end of that time, they would cleave to him, and sacrifice to Jupiter, or most surely die.

This interval they spent in distributing to poor creatures all that remained of their goods, that they might be quite free to depart hence to the Lord, and so succoured many by whom they have long since been received into everlasting habitations. On the tenth day Terentian, Prefect of the Praetorian Cohort, was sent to them, bringing with him the image of Jupiter. He explained to them the command of the Emperor, that they should worship the said image or die. They were engaged in prayer, but answered him that for their loyalty to Christ, whom their understanding acknowledged and their mouths confessed to be God, they felt no hesitation in choosing to suffer death.

Terentian, to avoid the uproar, which might have been caused by their public execution, caused their heads to be cut off at home where they then were. They lifted up their last earthly testimony upon the 26th day of June. They were privately buried, and a story set about that they had been sent into exile. The fact of their death was made generally known by the unclean spirits by whom the bodies of many were tormented, and among others that of Terentian's own son, who was possessed with a devil, and delivered by being brought to the grave of the Martyrs. By this miracle he was led to believe in Christ, and so likewise was his father Terentian, who is said to have been the writer of the life of these blessed Martyrs.

Nativity of St John the Baptist

6/24/2014

The Lesson is taken from a Sermon by St. Augustine the Bishop

In addition to the most holy Nativity of the Lord, we find celebrated in the Gospel the birth of only one other, namely, that of blessed John Baptist. As for all others among God's holy and chosen ones, we know that for their feast is observed the day whereon, with their work finished, and the world conquered and finally trampled down, they were born from this into a better life, even into everlasting blessedness. Thus in others is honoured the day on which their merits were completed, that is, the last day of their dying life. But in John is honoured the first day, for in him the very beginning is found hallowed. And the reason that the Nativity of John is so much made of in Scripture is, without doubt, that the Lord wished John to be an attestation to his own first coming; for if Christ had come too suddenly and unexpectedly, men might not have recognized him. And on this wise John was a figure of the Old Testament, and shewed in his own person a typical embodiment of the Law; for he heralded beforehand the coming of the Saviour, even as the Law was our schoolmaster to bring us to the grace of Christ.

But as touching this, that he prophesied while yet in the hidden depths of his mother's womb, and while himself lightless bore testimony to the truth, we are to understand it as a figure how that while himself wrapped round with the veil and carnal ordinances of the letter, he by the spirit preached unto the world a Redeemer, and testified that Jesus is our Lord even while for himself, working under the law, the birth of the new dispensation was still in the womb of the future, and not come to day. The Jews were estranged from the womb, that is from the Law, that womb heavy with the Christ that was to be; they went astray from the belly, speaking lies, and therefore John came for a witness, to bear witness of the Light, that all men through him might believe.

But as for this, that when John had heard in the prison the works of Christ, he sent two of his disciples, this is the Law sending to the Gospel. For John here was a figure of the Law, imprisoned in ignorance, lying in the dark, and in a hidden place, and he was fettered through Jewish misunderstanding within the bonds of the letter. But of him was it said, as is written in the Blessed Evangelist, He was a burning and a shining light, that is to say, that, when the whole world was wrapt in the night of ignorance, this Saint was kindled by the fire of the Holy Ghost, to shew before men the light of salvation, and at the hour of the thickest darkness of sin, appeared like a bright morning star to herald the rising of that sun so right gloriously radiant, the Son of righteousness, Christ our Lord. And this is why John said of himself: I am the voice of one crying in the wilderness.

Saint for Today - St Aloyisius

6/21/2014

Aloysius, eldest son of Ferdinand Gonzaga, Marquess of Castiglione, was so hurriedly baptized on account of danger that he seemed to be born to heaven almost before he was born to earth, and he so faithfully kept that his first grace that he seemed to have been confirmed therein. From his first use of reason, which he employed to offer himself to God, he led a life more holy day by day. At Florence, when he was nine years old, he made a vow of perpetual virginity before the Altar of the Blessed Virgin, upon whom he always looked as in the place of a mother to him, and by a remarkable mercy, from God, he kept this vow wholly and without the slightest impure temptation, either of mind or body, during his whole life. As for any other uprisings of the soul, he began at that age to check them so sternly, that he was never more pricked by even their earliest movements. His senses, and especially, his eye-sight, he so mortified, that he never once looked upon the face of Mary of Austria, whom, when he was for several years one of the Pages of honour of the King of Spain, he saluted almost every day and he even denied himself in part, the pleasure of looking on the face of his own mother. He might indeed have been justly called a fleshless man, or an in-fleshed angel.

With this fettering of the senses he added torture of the body. He kept three days as fasts in every week, and that mostly upon a little bread and water. But indeed he as it were fasted every day, for he hardly ever took so much as an ounce weight of food at breakfast. Often also, even thrice in one day, he would lash himself to flowing of blood with cords, or prick himself with spiked chains. He sometimes used a dog-whip, instead of a scourge, and the rowels of spurs instead of hair-cloth. He privately filled his soft bed with pieces of broken plates, that he might find it easier to wake to pray. He passed great part of the night, clad only in a shirt even in the depth of winter, kneeling on the ground, or lying flat on his face when too weak and weary to remain upright, busied with heavenly thoughts. Sometimes he would keep himself thus for three, four, or five hours, until he had spent at least one without any movement of body or any wandering of mind. Such perseverance obtained for him the reward of being able to keep his understanding quite concentrated in prayer without distraction, as though rapt in God in an unbroken ecstasy. Desiring to give himself up to Him alone, he overcame, after a strong opposition for three years, the objections of his father, procured the transfer to his brother of his right to the Marquessate, and on the 25th of November, 1585, joined at Rome the Society of Jesus, to which he had been called by a voice from heaven when he was at Madrid.

In his very Novitiate he began to be held a master of all godliness. His obedience to even the most trifling rules was absolutely exact, his indifference to the world extraordinary, and his hatred of self implacable. His love of God was so keen that it gradually undermined his bodily strength. Being commanded to give his mind some rest from thinking unceasingly of God, he struggled vainly to distract himself from Him Who met him everywhere. From tender love toward his neighbour, he joyfully ministered to the sick in the public hospitals, during the great distemper at Rome in 1591, and in the exercise of this charity he caught a deadly disease. This sickness slowly wore him away, and soon after he had entered on the 24th year of his age, upon the 21st day of June, a day which he had himself foretold, after entreating that he might be scourged, and laid upon the ground to die, he passed away to heaven. What the glory is which he there enjoyeth holy Mary Magdalen de' Pazzi was enabled, by the revelation of God, to behold, and she declared that it was such as she had hardly believed existed even in heaven, and that his holiness and love were so great that she should call him an unknown martyr of charity. On earth God glorified him by many great miracles. These being duly proved, Benedict XIII inserted the name of this angellad in the Calendar of the Saints, and commended him to all young scholars both as a pattern of innocency and purity, and as a patron.

Saint for Today - St Silverius

6/20/2014

Silverius was a native of Campania, and succeeded Agapitus in the Papacy. His orthodoxy and holiness shone brightest in his onslaughts upon heretics, and he shewed admirable firmness in upholding a sentence by Agapitus. Agapitus had deposed Anthimus from the Patriarchate of Constantinople for defending the heresy of Eutyches; and Silverius would never allow of his restoration, although the Empress Theodora repeatedly asked him to do so. The woman was enraged at him on this account, and ordered Bellisarius to send Silverius into exile. He was accordingly banished to the island of Ponza, whence he is said to have written these words to Bishop Amator: I am fed upon the bread of tribulation and the water of affliction, but nevertheless I have not given up, and I will not give up, doing my duty. But sickness and the hardships of his exile soon broke his strength, and he fell asleep in the Lord upon the 20th day of June. His body was taken to Rome, and laid in the Vatican Basilica and made illustrious by many miracles. He ruled the Church for more than three years, and ordained in the month of December thirteen Priests, five Deacons, and nineteen Bishops for divers Sees.

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