St. Bridget of Sweden…I never knew the power of the revelations to St. Bridget of Sweden until my friend Denise “reintroduced” them to me. I say “reintroduced”, because I had bought the Pieta Prayer booklet (where they can be found) back in 1987. I offered them, really, only for a short while before packing the book away. But years later, after seeing how the revelations touched the heart of my dear friend, I dug the booklet out and started praying them again (as faithfully as I could). They are very powerful and beautiful. Meditating on the Passion of our Lord with the intensity called for in this particular devotion will change your life…are you ready? How many of you out there have the Pieta prayer book and know the stories of St. Bridget of Sweden?
(oh, be sure not to confuse her with St. Brigid of Kildare…it happens all the time)
Here is the audio mp3 download of the 15 Prayers of St. Bridget
Here is the chapel in St. Paul’s Outside the Walls in Rome where St. Bridget received the private revelation of the 15 prayers…….
Of course, St. Bridget is more than just her prayers…ordinary woman, extraordinary life!. To learn more about St. Bridget of Sweden, take a look at this:
Monday June 30th 2008, 10:23 am
Filed under: Patristics
Today’s the feast of the first Roman Martyrs. Theirs is a story you just have to hear. But first we have to backtrack a little bit.
In July of A.D. 64, during the tenth year of Nero’s reign, a great fire consumed much of the city of Rome. The fire raged out of control for seven days — and then it started again, mysteriously, a day later. Many in Rome knew that Nero had been eager to do some urban redevelopment. He had a plan that included an opulent golden palace for himself. The problem was that so many buildings were standing in his way — many of them teeming wooden tenements housing Rome’s poor and working class.
The fire seemed too convenient for Nero’s purposes — and his delight in watching the blaze didn’t relieve anybody’s suspicions. If he didn’t exactly fiddle while Rome burned, he at least recited his poems. Nero needed a scapegoat, and an upstart religious cult, Jewish in origin and with foreign associations, served his purposes well. Nero, who was a perverse expert at human torment, had some of its members tortured till they were so mad they would confess to any crime. Once they had confessed, he had others arrested.
He must have known, however, that the charges would not hold up. So he condemned them not for arson, or treason, or conspiracy, but for “hatred of humanity.”
To amuse the people, he arranged for their execution to be a spectacle, entertainment on a grand scale. The Roman historian Tacitus (who had contempt for the religion, but greater contempt for Nero) describes in gruesome detail the tortures that took place amid a party in Nero’s gardens.
Mockery of every sort was added to their deaths. Covered with the skins of beasts, they were torn by dogs and perished, or were nailed to crosses, or were doomed to the flames. These served to illuminate the night when daylight failed. Nero had thrown open the gardens for the spectacle, and was exhibiting a show in the circus, while he mingled with the people in the dress of a charioteer or drove about in a chariot. Hence, even for criminals who deserved extreme and exemplary punishment there arose a feeling of compassion; for it was not, as it seemed, for the public good, but to glut one man’s cruelty, that they were being punished.
That is all we know about the first Roman martyrs. We know none of their names. Tacitus doesn’t tell us why they were willing to die this way rather than renounce their faith. Yet this should be an important question for us to consider. Why did the martyrs do this? What prepared them to face death so bravely? To what exactly did they bear witness with their death?
The answers to these questions (and many more) can be found in the rest of the article, at the archive of Touchstone Magazine. The article originated in a talk I gave in Rome in 2005 on the feast of the Roman Martyrs. It’s called “The Roman Martyrs and Their Mass.”
Today, 24 June, the liturgy invites us to celebrate the Solemnity of the Birth of St John the Baptist, whose life was totally directed to Christ, as was that of Mary, Christ’s Mother.
John the Baptist was the forerunner, the “voice” sent to proclaim the Incarnate Word. Thus, commemorating his birth actually means celebrating Christ, the fulfilment of the promises of all the prophets, among whom the greatest was the Baptist, called to “prepare the way” for the Messiah (cf. Mt 11: 9-10).
All the Gospels introduce the narrative of Jesus’ public life with the account of his baptism by John in the River Jordan. St Luke frames the Baptist’s entrance on the scene in a solemn historical setting.
My book Jesus of Nazareth also begins with the Baptism of Jesus in the Jordan, an event which had enormous echoes in his day. People flocked from Jerusalem and every part of Judea to listen to John the Baptist and have themselves baptized in the river by him, confessing their sins (cf. Mk 1: 5).
The baptizing prophet became so famous that many asked themselves whether he was the Messiah. The Evangelist, however, specifically denied this: “I am not the Christ” (Jn 1: 20).
Nevertheless, he was the first “witness” of Jesus, having received instructions from Heaven: “He on whom you see the Spirit descend and remain, this is he who baptizes with the Holy Spirit” (Jn 1: 33).
This happened precisely when Jesus, after receiving baptism, emerged from the water: John saw the Spirit descending upon him in the form of a dove. It was then that he “knew” the full reality of Jesus of Nazareth and began to make him “known to Israel” (Jn 1: 31), pointing him out as the Son of God and Redeemer of man: “Behold, the Lamb of God, who takes away the sin of the world!” (Jn 1: 29).
As an authentic prophet, John bore witness to the truth without compromise. He denounced transgressions of God’s commandments, even when it was the powerful who were responsible for them. Thus, when he accused Herod and Herodias of adultery, he paid with his life, sealing with martyrdom his service to Christ who is Truth in person.
Let us invoke his intercession, together with that of Mary Most Holy, so that also in our day the Church will remain ever faithful to Christ and courageously witness to his truth and his love for all.
We love to hear the stories of the lives of the saints, especially those we are not familiar with! So we owe a big thank you to
Brian O’Neel for shining the light on 39 holy unknowns in “Saint Who?”. Men and women, clerics, religious, and laity, married and single, there’s story from all walks of life. The book contains a short biography of each saint, a section on why that saint merits our attention and devotion today, and a short prayer. He also discusses with us what makes a blessed, what makes them a saint. A wonderful read.
Thousands of saints are formally recognized by the Catholic Church. While some are household names, have you heard of:
St. Bathilde, the slave queen?
St. Pietro Parenzo, the heavenly politician?
Bl. Sebastian de Aparicio, the first cowboy?
St. Mary Helen MacKillop, the excommunicated saint?
From these now-obscure saints or blesseds come amazing stories of virtue, vice, and the triumph of grace. Brian O’Neel tells these tales, often colorful and always compelling, with humor tempered by an obvious love for his subjects, explaining why they deserve our attention and devotion.
I didn’t know anything about him until I traveled to Rome and visited the Church of St. Igantius of Loyola. I encountered this beautiful altar dedicated to this young saint who died at the age of 23. I wanted to learn about this youth who was so highly venerated by the Society of Jesus, who even someone as great as St. Robert Bellarmine wanted to be buried near. His story is poignant and a strong witness to the power of grace, no wonder they love him so.
Aloysius is the Latin form of Gonzaga’s given name, Luigi. In English, the equivalent form would be Louis. The Gonzaga name is well known in Italy. Aloysius Gonzaga was born at Castiglione near Mantua, Italy, in 1568 to a celebrated family of wealth and prestige. As the first born son of his father, Ferrante, and his mother, Marta, he was in line to inherit his father’s title of Marquis. He grew up amid the violence and brutality of the Renaissance Italy and witnessed the murder of two of his brothers. In 1576, Aloysius’ parents sent him to attend the court of the Grand Duke of Tuscany, Francesco de’Medici, in Florence. Later, accompanied by his parents, he traveled to Spain to join the court of Philip II in Madrid.
In Spain, Aloysius decided he wanted to join the newly founded religious order, The Society of Jesus. His father resisted his decision and there followed a struggle of wills that continued after his return to Castiglione in 1584. But Aloysius eventually prevailed.
Renouncing his right to the title of Marquis and to the vast wealth he was destined to inherit, he entered the Society of Jesus in Rome on November 25, 1585. During his early studies in Rome, he would regularly go out into the streets of the city to care for victims of the plague. He himself contracted the disease as a result of his efforts for the suffering and died on June 21, 1591, at the age of twenty-three, six years short of his ordination as a Jesuit priest.
Even before his time as a Jesuit, Aloysius was known for his love of prayer and fasting. He received his First Communion from St. Charles Borromeo. As a Jesuit at the Roman College, he continued to devote his time to prayer and practices of austerity. His spiritual director was Robert Bellarmine who later was canonized and declared a doctor of the church. When Robert was dying, he asked to be buried next to the grave of Aloysius. Today, they rest next to each other in the church of St. Ignatius Loyola in Rome. Pope Benedict XIII canonized Aloysius in 1726, and three years later declared him to be the patron of youth in the Catholic Church, an honor later confirmed by Pope Pius XI in 1926.
“The lives of the saints are not limited to their earthly biographies but also include their being and working in God after death. In the saints one thing becomes clear: those who draw near to God do not withdraw from men, but rather become truly close to them.”(Deus Caritas est 42).
In February 2011 we published a short article on Sister Marguerite Rutan, Daughter of Charity and martyr (see www.filles-de-la-charite.org/en/news). As her beatification approaches we invite you to learn more about her life. Who is this new example of Vincentian holiness?
A presentation of her life:
Marguerite Rutan was born on 23 April 1736 in Metz in Lorraine and was baptized the same day. Marguerite was the 8th of 15 children. Marie Forat, her mother, was very Christian and her father, Charles Gaspard Rutan was an honest and courageous workman. With them she learned to live her life as a gift from God.
Her father introduced her to mathematics and linear design. Soon she was able to keep the accounts of his business. She helped with all her family until she was 21 years old.
She had the profound conviction she was being called by Jesus. With Him she looked for a way to give herself to the service of those who were poor.
In 1756, Marguerite Rutan entered the Company of the Daughters of Charity to be near those who were suffering, marginalized or excluded. She wanted to serve them. Following Christ she encouraged charity in those around her. For over 20 years she placed everything she received from God and others at the service of the poorest of the poor, no matter where she was sent by her superiors.
In 1779 she was sent to serve in the Hospital of Dax. Sr. Marguerite and her Sisters worked for 10 years relating with the townspeople. The Sisters were admired and respected.
In 1789 the troubling period of the Revolution began. It profoundly changed the country and personally touched Sr. Marguerite with suffering and death (April 9, 1794). Her faithfulness to Christ and the Church lead her to martyrdom. The life of Sr. Marguerite was anchored in the person of Christ and his Word. Each day she profoundly encountered the love of Christ which drew her to serve as He served.
Following Christ, servant of her brothers and sisters, kneeling to wash their feet, Sr. Marguerite gave her life to serve the poor and the sick and building brotherhood with all.
Following Christ, servant of the will of the Father, Sr. Marguerite based her life on the Gospel, desiring only one thing: to do the will of God.
Following Christ, servant of the suffering, despised, persecuted, Sr. Marguerite abandoned herself totoally to God. During the revolutionary turmoil, she showed the extremity of her love.
Two weeks ago I presented St Francis of Assisi. This morning I would like to speak of another saint who belonged to the first generation of the Friars Minor: Anthony of Padua, or of Lisbon, as he is also called with reference to his native town. He is one of the most popular Saints in the whole Catholic Church, venerated not only in Padua, where a splendid Basilica has been built that contains his mortal remains, but also throughout the world. Dear to the faithful are the images and statues that portray him with the lily a symbol of his purity or with the Child Jesus in his arms, in memory of a miraculous apparition mentioned in several literary sources.
With his outstanding gifts of intelligence, balance, apostolic zeal and, primarily, mystic fervour, Anthony contributed significantly to the development of Franciscan spirituality.
He was born into a noble family in Lisbon in about 1195 and was baptized with the name of Fernando. He entered the Canons who followed the monastic Rule of St Augustine, first at St Vincent’s Monastery in Lisbon and later at that of the Holy Cross in Coimbra, a renowned cultural centre in Portugal. He dedicated himself with interest and solicitude to the study of the Bible and of the Church Fathers, acquiring the theological knowledge that was to bear fruit in his teaching and preaching activities. The event that represented a decisive turning point on his life happened in Coimbra. It was there, in 1220, that the relics were exposed of the first five Franciscan missionaries who had gone to Morocco, where they had met with martyrdom. Their story inspired in young Fernando the desire to imitate them and to advance on the path of Christian perfection. Thus he asked to leave the Augustinian Canons to become a Friar Minor. His request was granted and, having taken the name of Anthony, he too set out for Morocco, but divine Providence disposed otherwise. After an illness he was obliged to return to Italy and, in 1221, participated in the famous “Chapter of the Mats” in Assisi, where he also met St Francis. He then lived for a period in complete concealment in a convent at Forlì in northern Italy, where the Lord called him to another mission. Invited, in somewhat casual circumstances, to preach on the occasion of a priestly ordination, he showed himself to be endowed with such knowledge and eloquence that the Superiors assigned him to preaching. Thus he embarked on apostolic work in Italy and France that was so intense and effective that it induced many people who had left the Church to retrace their footsteps. Anthony was also one of the first if not the first theology teachers of the Friars Minor. He began his teaching in Bologna with the blessing of St Francis who, recognizing Anthony’s virtues, sent him a short letter that began with these words: “I would like you to teach the brethren theology”. Anthony laid the foundations of Franciscan theology which, cultivated by other outstanding thinkers, was to reach its apex with St Bonaventure of Bagnoregio and Bl. Duns Scotus.
Having become Provincial Superior of the Friars Minor in northern Italy, he continued his ministry of preaching, alternating it with his office of governance. When his term as Provincial came to an end, he withdrew to a place near Padua where he had stayed on various other occasions. Barely a year later, he died at the city gates on 13 June 1231. Padua, which had welcomed him with affection and veneration in his lifetime, has always accorded him honour and devotion. Pope Gregory IX himself, having heard him preach, described him as the “Ark of the Testament” and subsequent to miracles brought about through his intercession canonized him in 1232, only a year after his death.
In the last period of his life, Anthony put in writing two cycles of “Sermons”, entitled respectively “Sunday Sermons” and “Sermons on the Saints” destined for the Franciscan Order’s preachers and teachers of theological studies. In these Sermons he commented on the texts of Scripture presented by the Liturgy, using the patristic and medieval interpretation of the four senses: the literal or historical, the allegorical or Christological, the tropological or moral, and the anagogical, which orients a person to eternal life. Today it has been rediscovered that these senses are dimensions of the one meaning of Sacred Scripture and that it is right to interpret Sacred Scripture by seeking the four dimensions of its words. St Anthony’s sermons are theological and homiletical texts that echo the live preaching in which Anthony proposes a true and proper itinerary of Christian life. The richness of spiritual teaching contained in the “Sermons” was so great that in 1946 Venerable Pope Pius XII proclaimed Anthony a Doctor of the Church, attributing to him the title “Doctor Evangelicus”, since the freshness and beauty of the Gospel emerge from these writings. We can still read them today with great spiritual profit.
In these Sermons St Anthony speaks of prayer as of a loving relationship that impels man to speak gently with the Lord, creating an ineffable joy that sweetly enfolds the soul in prayer. Anthony reminds us that prayer requires an atmosphere of silence, which does not mean distance from external noise but rather is an interior experience that aims to remove the distractions caused by a soul’s anxieties, thereby creating silence in the soul itself. According to this prominent Franciscan Doctor’s teaching, prayer is structured in four indispensable attitudes which in Anthony’s Latin are defined as obsecratio, oratio, postulatio, gratiarum actio. We might translate them in the following manner. The first step in prayer is confidently opening one’s heart to God; this is not merely accepting a word but opening one’s heart to God’s presence. Next, is speaking with him affectionately, seeing him present with oneself; then a very natural thing presenting our needs to him; and lastly, praising and thanking him.
In St Anthony’s teaching on prayer we perceive one of the specific traits of the Franciscan theology that he founded: namely the role assigned to divine love which enters into the sphere of the affections, of the will and of the heart, and which is also the source from which flows a spiritual knowledge that surpasses all other knowledge. In fact, it is in loving that we come to know.
Anthony writes further: “Charity is the soul of faith, it gives it life; without love, faith dies” (Sermones Dominicales et Festivi II, Messagero, Padua 1979, p. 37).
Glorious St Anthony, perfect imitator of Jesus, who received from God the special power of restoring lost things, grant that I may find … which has been lost. At least restore my peace and tranquillity of mind, the loss of which has afflicted me even more than my material loss. To this favour I ask another of you: that I may always remain in possession of the true good that is God. Let me rather lose all things than lose God, my supreme good. Let me never suffer the loss of my greatest treasure, eternal life with God.
Amen.
Leave it to the wonderfully thoughtful Mike Aquilina to bring us the lives of just some of those glorious maternal nurturers we call “the Mothers of the Church”. From the well known Sts. Perpetua and Felicity and St. Monica to lesser known “mothers” like Proba the Poet and St. Olympias, Mike, along with his co-author Christopher Bailey, share their inspiring stories. Mike Aquilina’s sincere love for these women and the witness they have provided us in our present age helps us to appreciate, once again, what God can do with ordinary people who are open to His extraordinary grace.
Holy Women of the New Testament
–St. Blandina
–St. Perpetua and St. Felicity
–St. Helena
–St. Thecla
–St. Agnes of Rome
–St. Macrina
–Proba the Widow
–St. Marcella
–St. Paula
–St. Eustochium
–St. Monica
–Egeria the Tourist
Show 4 ” Building a Kingdom of Love” – The Power of Baptism: a story of Bl. Mother Teresa, a princess, and a baby named Cecilia
Msgr. Esseff reflects on the power of Christ given to us in our baptism. He tells two poignant stories about Bl. Mother Teresa, a princess and a baby named Cecilia. Do we appreciate the gift? Msgr. Esseff also addresses the fears and concerns grandparents have when their children fail to have their own children baptized. Be not afraid…call on the Blessed Virgin Mary and the Holy Rosary.
Msgr. John A. Esseff is a Roman Catholic priest in the Diocese of Scranton. He was ordained on May 30th 1953, by the late Bishop William J. Hafey, D.D. at St. Peter’s Cathedral in Scranton, PA. Msgr. Esseff served a retreat director and confessor to Blessed Mother Teresa. He continues to offer direction and retreats for the sisters of the missionaries of charity around the world. Msgr. Esseff encountered St. Padre Pio, who would become a spiritual father to him. He has lived in areas around the world, serving in the Pontifical missions, a Catholic organization established by Bl. Pope John Paul II to bring the Good News to the world especially to the poor. Msgr. Esseff assisted the founders of the Institute for Priestly Formation and continues to serve as a spiritual director for the Institute. He continues to serve as a retreat leader and director to bishops, priests and sisters and seminarians and other religious leaders around the world.
To obtain a copy of Msgr. Esseff’s book byvisiting here
St. Bridget of Sweden…I never knew the power of the revelations to St. Bridget of Sweden until my friend Denise “reintroduced” them to me. I say “reintroduced”, because I had bought the Pieta Prayer booklet (where they can be found) back in 1987. I offered them, really, only for a short while before packing the book away. But years later, after seeing how the revelations touched the heart of my
dear friend, I dug the booklet out and started praying them again (as faithfully as I could). They are very powerful and beautiful. Meditating on the Passion of our Lord with the intensity called for in this particular devotion will change your life…are you ready? How many of you out there have the Pieta prayer book and know the stories of St. Bridget of Sweden?
