Our Morning Offering – 4 December – Friday of the First Week of Advent and the Memorial of St John Damascene (675-749) Father and Doctor of the Church
God, my God, May I Always Abide in You By St John Damascene (675-749)
God, my God, unextinguishable and invisible fire, You make Your angels flaming fire. Out of Your inexpressible love, You have given me Your divine Flesh as food and through this communion of Your immaculate Body and precious Blood, You receive me as a partaker of Your divinity. Permeate all my body and soul, all my bones and sinews. Consume my sins in fire. Enlighten my soul and illumine my mind. Sanctify my body and make Your abode in me together with Your blessed Father and all-holy Spirit, that I may always abide in You, through the intercession of Your immaculate Mother and all Your saints. Amen
Saint of the Day – 4 December – Saint Osmund (Died 1099) Bishop of Salisbury, Confessor, Count of Sées, was a Norman noble, Lord Chancellor (c 1070-1078). Osmund is Also known as Edimund, Edmund, Osimund. Additional Memorial – 16 July (translation of his relics). St Osmund was born at Seez, Normandy, France and died during the night of 3 or early hours of 4 December in 1099 at Salisbury, England of natural causes. Patronages – against insanity or mental illness, against paralysis, against ruptures, against toothache, of paralysed people.
Osmund, a native of Normandy, was the son of Count Henry of Seez and Isabella, half-sister of King William the Conqueror of England. He took part in the Norman Conquest and served William as his Chancellor and accompanied him to England and was made Chancellor of the realm about 1070. He was employed in many civil transactions and was engaged as one of the Chief Commissioners for drawing up the Do0mesday Book. He was created Earl of Dorset at the same time but he did not refer to himself with that title.
Osmund became Bishop of Salisbury by authority of Pope Gregory VII and was consecrated by Blessed Archbishop Lanfranc (see link to Blessed Lanfranc’s life below) around 3 June 1078. His Diocese comprised the counties of Dorset, Wiltshire and Berkshire, having absorbed the former bishoprics of Sherborne and Ramsbury under its incumbent at the 1075 Council of London. In his Acts of the English Bishops, William of Malmesbury describes medieval Salisbury as a fortress rather than a city, placed on a high hill, surrounded by a massive wall. Peter of Blois later referred to the castle and Church as “the ark of God shut up in the temple of Baal.”
Salisbury Cathedral
He set about organising the new Diocese and providing it with its first Cathedral at Sarum. In establishing its constitution, he made it a model for many other such foundations. He is also regarded as the origin of the Sarum tradition of worship, even if it may have developed and been formalised later. Osmund also collected manuscripts for the Cathedral library, was a copier and binder of books, authored a life of St Aldhelm and was responsible for drawing up the books governing the liturgical matters for the Diocese such as the Mass and Divine Office, the so-called Sarum Use. Osmund also founded a Cathedral chapter of canons regular and a seminary for clerics.
Henry I’s biographer C Warren Hollister suggests the possibility that Osmund was in part responsible for Henry’s education; Henry was consistently in the Bishop’s company during his formative years, around 1080 to 1086.
Osmund assisted the king in assembling the massive census which became the Domesday Book and in 1086, he was present at the Great Gemot (political meeting) held at Old Sarum when the Domesday Book was accepted and the great landowners swore fealty to the sovereign.
In the dispute over investiture between King William II and St Anselm of Canterbury, Osmund initially sided with the king but later he admitted he had made a mistake and he begged Anselm’s forgiveness.
Osmund died in the night of 3 December 1099 and was succeeded, after the see had been vacant for eight years, by Roger of Salisbury, a statesman and counsellor of Henry I. His remains were buried at Old Sarum, translated to New Salisbury on 23 July 1457, and deposited in the Lady Chapel, where his sumptuous shrine was destroyed under Henry VIII. A flat slab with the simple inscription “MXCIX” has lain in various parts of the Cathedral. In 1644 it was in the middle of the Lady Chapel. It is now under the easternmost arch on the south side.
William of Malmesbury, in summing up Osmund’s character, says he was “so eminent for chastity that common fame would itself blush to speak otherwise than truthfully concerning his virtue. Stern he might appear to penitents but not more severe to them than to himself. Free from ambition, he neither imprudently wasted his own substance, nor sought the wealth of others.”
The cause for Osmund’s Canonisation began and was pursued from 1228. Pope Callistus III Canonised him in 1457. He was the last English person to be declared a Saint until the Canonisation of Sts Thomas More and John Fisher in 1935.
Prayer: Almighty God, the light of the faithful and shepherd of souls, who set Your servant Osmund to be a Bishop in the Church, to feed Your sheep by the word of Christ and to guide them by good example, give us grace to keep the faith of the Church and so to follow in the footsteps of Jesus Christ, the Chief Shepherd and Bishop of our souls, that we may, with Osmund, come to that everlasting joy which is His promise to us. Amen.
St Bernardo degli Uberti St Bertoara of Bourges St Christianus St Clement of Alexandria St Cyran of Brenne St Eraclius St Eulogio Álvarez López St Ezequiel Álvaro de La Fuente St Felix of Bologna Bl Francis Galvez St Francisco de la Vega González St Giovanni Calabria St Heraclas of Alexandria St Jacinto García Chicote Bl Jerome de Angelis St John the Wonder Worker St Maruthas St Melitus of Pontus St Osmund (Died 1099) Bishop Bl Pietro Tecelano St Prudens St Robustiano Mata Ubierna St Sigiranus Bl Simon Yempo St Sola St Theophanes
Martyred in the Spanish Civil War: • Blessed Eulogio Álvarez López • Blessed Ezequiel Álvaro de La Fuente • Blessed Francisco de la Vega González • Blessed Jacinto García Chicote • Blessed Robustiano Mata Ubierna
Thought for the Day – 3 December – Meditations with Antonio Cardinal Bacci (1881-1971)
Recollection
“The Holy Spirit places the following words on the lips of the prophet Jeremias. “With desolation is all the land made desolate, because, there is none that considereth in the heart” (Jer 12:11). Dissipation is the mark of the worldly and of the mediocre. The worldling is dissipated because, instead of seeking happiness in God, he looks for it in earthly pleasures and even in sin. The mediocre Christian, on the other hand, oscillates between God and the world. He fails to make a definite choice between virtue and sacrifice on one side and his own comfort and satisfaction on the other.
The dissipated soul is absorbed in many things and has no time to reflect on the eternal truths or to think of God and of spiritual progress. As a result, it is incapable of solid virtue, or, if it achieves this for a while, it soon evaporates. The man who is recollected retires silently into the presence of God whenever he can. He derives consolation from conversation with God and responds generously to His inspirations. The man who is dissipated, wastes the graces which God gives him, is deaf to His appeals and because he is too much in contact with material things, ends by forgetting Heaven and by being drawn by His passions towards spiritual destruction. By depriving us of God’s grace, dissipation leads to sin and to the death of the soul. Have we not had personal experience of this?”
Show forth Your power Lord and come. Come in Your great strength and save us.
“Everyone then who hears these words of mine and does them will be like a wise man who built his house on the rock. And the rain fell and the floods came and the winds blew and beat on that house but it did not fall, because it had been founded on the rock.” … Matthew 7:24-25
REFLECTION – “The just, (that is to say those who in baptism have put on the new man created in justice) live, insofar as they are just, by faith, by the light that the sacrament of illumination brings to them. The more they live by faith, the more they realise in themselves, the perfection of His divine adoption. Notice this expression carefully: ‘EX fide,’ the exact meaning of this is that faith ought to be the root of all our actions, of all our life. There are souls who live with faith (CUM fide). They have faith and one cannot deny that they practise it. But it is only on certain occasions … that they remember their faith to any purpose. … But when faith is living, strong, ardent, when we live by faith, that is to say, when in everything, we are actuated by the principles of faith, when faith is the root of all our actions, the inward principle of all our activity, then we become strong and steadfast, in spite of difficulties within and without, in spite of obscurities, contradictions and temptations. Why so? Because, by faith, we judge, we estimate all things as God sees and estimates them – we participate in the divine immutability and stability. Is not this what our Lord said? “Everyone who listens to these words of mine and acts on them” – that is to live by faith – “will be like a wise man who built his house on rock. The rain fell, the floods came, and the winds blew and buffeted the house. But it did not collapse.” For Jesus Christ immediately adds: “it had been set solidly on rock” (Mt 7:24-25).” … Bl Columba Marmion (1858-1923) Abbot – Our Faith, the Victory over the World (Christ, the Ideal of the Monk)
PRAYER – God our Father, You open the gates of the kingdom of heaven to those who are born again of water and the Holy Spirit. Increase the grace You have given, so that the people who have been purified from all sin, may not forfeit the promised blessing of Your love. Grant that we may ever keep Your Son, the Lord Jesus Christ, before our eyes and do all in Him and through Him and for Him. And may the prayers of Your great missioner, St Francis Xavier, he who lived Your words, strengthen our faith.
Our Morning Offering – 3 December – Thursday of the First week of Advent and The Memorial of St Francis Xavier SJ (1506-1552)
I Love Thee, God, I Love Thee By St Francis Xavier Translated by Gerard Manley Hopkins SJ (1844-1889)
I love Thee, God, I love Thee— Not out of hope for heaven for me Nor fearing not to love and be In the everlasting burning. Thou, my Jesus, after me Didst reach Thine arms out dying, For my sake suffered nails and lance, Mocked and marred countenance, Sorrows passing number, Sweat and care and cumber, Yea and death and this for me, And Thou could see me sinning. Then I, why should not I love Thee, Jesu so much in love with me? Not for heaven’s sake, not to be Out of hell by loving Thee, Not for any gains I see, But just the way that Thou didst me I do love and will love Thee. What must I love Thee, Lord, for then? For being my king and God. Amen
Saint of the Day – 3 December – Saint Emma of Bremen (c 975–1038) Married Laywoman, Princess, mother and widow, apostle of the poor, founder of Churches. Also known as Emma of Lesum, Emma of Stiepel, Hemma, Imma. Born in c 975 and died on 3 December 1038 of natural causes.
Emma was born into the Saxon noble family of the Immedinger, descendants of Widukind. She married Liudger, a son of the Saxon duke Hermann Billung and brother of Bernard I, Duke of Saxony. Emperor Otto III made the couple a present in 1001 of the Pfalz or palatium in Stiepel), where, in 1008 Emma had a church built dedicated to the Virgin Mary, which later became a popular place of pilgrimage. The only child of the marriage was Imad, who was Ordained a Priest and later was consecrated as the Bishop of Paderborn in 1051.
After the early death of her husband in 1011, Emma withdrew to the estate of Lesum (now Bremen-Burglesum) and with her fortune, generously supported Bremen Cathedral and granted the Cathedral chapter her property at Stiepel with its church.
She was portrayed as a great benefactress of the Church and indeed, founded a number of Churches in the Bremen area, although her greatest care was for the poor.
Emma was later venerated as a Saint, although there is no evidence that she was formally ever either beatified or canonised. She was buried in Bremen Cathedral, where her tomb was still to be seen in the 16th century. Her tomb is one of the biggest in the cemetery. When the tomb was opened, her body had crumbled to dust except for her right hand (the hand that dispensed the help to the needy and the poor). That relic was placed in the Abbey of Saint Ludger at Werden.
There is a well-known Bremen legend concerning her gift of a meadow to the town in 1032. When a delegation of the townspeople approached her with a request for more meadowland, Emma promised them as much meadow as a man could run round in an hour. Her brother-in-law Bernard or Benno, Duke of Saxony, with an appraising eye on his inheritance, suggested mockingly that she might as well give them as much land as a man could run round in a day. Emma agreed to this but Bernard asked to choose the man who was to do the running and when Emma agreed to that too, picked out a legless cripple past whom they had just walked. This man proved, however, to have extraordinary strength and endurance and by the end of the day had succeeded in making his way round a very substantial area, bigger even than the present Bremen town meadow.
This story has been current in various forms since at least the 18th century, although there is no documentary evidence for it but gives a whole meaning to the inclusion of the figure of the “cripple” at the feet of the statue of Bremen Roland, the protector of the City of Bremen.
“Cripple” at the feet of the Roland statue in Bremen
St Abbo of Auxerre St Abran St Agapius St Agricola of Pannonia St Alvaro González López St Anthemius of Poitiers St Attalia of Strasbourg Bl Bernard of Toulouse OP Martyr St Birinus of Dorchester St Cassian of Tangiers St Claudius of Africa St Claudius the Martyr St Crispin of Africa St Edward Coleman St Eloque of Lagny St Emma of Bremen (c 975–1038) St Ethernan St Francisco Delgado González St Francisco Fernández Escosura St Hilaria the Martyr St Jason the Martyr Blessed Johann Nepomuk von Tschiderer (1777-1860) His Life: https://anastpaul.com/2019/12/03/saint-of-the-day-3-december-blessed-johann-nepomuk-von-tschiderer-1777-1860/ St John of Africa St Juan Bautista Ferris Llopis St Julián Heredia Zubia St Lucius St Lucy the Chaste St Magina of Africa St Mamas St Manuel Santiago y Santiago St Marcos García Rodríguez St Maurus the Martyr St Seleucus St Stephen of Africa St Theodore of Alexandria St Theodulus of Edessa St Valeriano Rodríguez García St Veranus Zephaniah the Prophet
Martyrs of Nicomedia: Christians martyred together in the persecutions of Diocletian – Ambicus, Julius and Victor. c 303 in Nicomedia, Bithynia (modern Izmit, Turkey).
Martyred in the Spanish Civil War: Thousands of people were murdered in the anti-Catholic persecutions of the Spanish Civil War from 1934 to 1939. • Blessed Alvaro González López • Blessed Francisco Delgado González • Blessed Francisco Fernández Escosura • Blessed Juan Bautista Ferris Llopis • Blessed Julián Heredia Zubia • Blessed Manuel Santiago y Santiago • Blessed Marcos García Rodríguez • Blessed Valeriano Rodríguez García
Thought for the Day – 2 December – Meditations with Antonio Cardinal Bacci (1881-1971)
Exactly What is the Peace of Jesus Christ?
“The spirit of peace pervades the Gospel. When Jesus is born, choirs of angels sing above the stable in Bethlehem: “Glory to God in the highest ad on earth, peace among men of good will” (Lk 2:14). When our Saviour has risen gloriously from the dead, He appears to His disciples and greets them with the words: “Peace be to you.” Finally, when He is departing from this earth, He leaves his peace to His followers as their inheritance. “Peace I leave with you,” He says to them, “my peace I give to you; not as the world gives, do I give to you. Do not let your heart be troubled or be afraid” (Jn 14:27).
Exactly what is the peace of Jesus Christ? It is much different from worldly peace, presuming that the world can give some kind of peace. St Paul says of the Saviour that “he himself is our peace” (Eph 2:14). How are we to understand what is meant by this? The Apostle himself explains when he writes: “Having been justified by faith, let us have peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ” (Rom 5:1). Jesus Christ, therefore, is our peacemaker. He has shouldered our iniquities and has offered Himself to the Father as a victim of expiation and of reconciliation. It is at the price of Christ’s precious blood, that we have regained peace with God and freedom from our sins. This is the peace which our Lord has given us. Let us remember, however, that if we return to the slavery of sin, we shall lose at once, the jewel of peace which Jesus Christ has bestowed on us. “There is no peace to the wicked” (Isa 48:22). We have experienced on many occasions how true this is. Sin destroys peace of soul because it deprives us of Jesus, without Whom, peace cannot survive. Let us resolve, therefore, to remain always close to our Lord and far from sin. Then only shall we be able to preserve our peace of mind in the midst of temptations and of earthly sorrows.
Quote of the Day – 2 December – Wednesday of the First Week of Advent and The Memorial of Bl Jan/John van Ruusbroec(k) (c 1293-1382)
“If we would God discern The world we must despise, His love and hate must learn, See all things with His eyes. And we must self forgo If God we would attain, His grace must in us grow And ease us from all pain. So shall we sing His praise And be at one with Him, In peace our voices raise In the celestial hymn, That with quadruple harmony And all mellifluous melody, In Heaven resounds eternally.”
Advent Reflection – 2 December – Wednesday of the First Week of Advent, Readings: Isaiah 25:6-10,Psalms 23:1-3, 3-4, 5, 6, Matthew 15:29-37 and the Memorial of Bl Jan/John van Ruysbroec(k) (c 1293-1382)
Come to us and save us, Lord God Almighty Let Your face smile on us and we shall be safe.
Jesus summoned his disciples and said, “My heart is moved with pity for the crowd, for they have been with me now for three days and have nothing to eat. I do not want to send them away hungry, for fear they may collapse on the way.” … Matthew 15:32
REFLECTION – “The second coming of Christ our Bridegroom takes place daily in good persons; indeed, it takes place frequently and repeatedly, with new gifts and graces, in all those who prepare themselves for it to the best of their ability. We do not intend to speak here of a person’s initial conversion or of the graces, which were first bestowed when he turned from sin to virtue. Rather, we wish to speak of a day-to-day increase in new gifts and new virtues and of a present, daily coming of Christ our Bridegroom into our soul. (…)
This is [a] coming of Christ our Bridegroom which takes place daily with an increase in graces and new gifts, for when a person receives any of the sacraments with a humble heart and without placing any obstacle in the way of the sacrament’s effects, then he receives new gifts and an increase of grace because of his humility and because of the mysterious working of Christ in the sacraments. (…) It is, then, another coming of Christ our Bridegroom which is present to us everyday. We should reflect on it with a heart full of desire so that it might take place in ourselves, for this coming is necessary, if we are to remain steadfast or go forward into eternal life.” … Bl Jan van Ruysbroec (1293-1381) Canon Regular – The Spiritual Espousals, Pt. 2
PRAYER – Prepare our hearts, Lord, by the power of Your grace. When Christ comes, may He find us worthy to receive from His hand, the Bread of Heaven at the feast of eternal life. Through our Lord Jesus Christ Your Son, with the Holy Spirit, God now and for all eternity, amen.
Our Morning Offering – 2 December – Wednesday of the First Week of Advent
Come, Sun and Saviour 8th Century Catholic Advent Prayer/Hymn
Come, Sun and Saviour, to embrace our gloomy world, i’s weary race, As groom to bride, as bride to groom: The wedding chamber, Mary’s womb. At Your great Name, O Jesus, now All knees must bend, all hearts must bow, All things on earth with one accord, Like those in heaven, shall call You Lord. Come in Your holy might, we pray, Redeem us for eternal day. Defend us while we dwell below, From all assaults of our dread foe. Amen
Saint of the Day – 2 December – Saint Chromatius of Aquileia (Died c 407) Bishop of Aquileia, Theologian, Exegete, Writer and friend of St Ambrose and Jerome, defender of St John Chrysostom. Chromatius opposed Arianism with much zeal and rooted it out in his Diocese.
Chromatius was brought up in the city of Aquileia, at the head of the Adriatic Sea. In all likelihood, he was born here as well. His father died when he was young and he lived with his mother, older brother and unmarried sisters. His mother had the good opinion of St Jerome, which the Saint expressed in a letter to her, quoted below, in 374. His brother, Eusebius, also became a Bishop and he is also a Saint. Chromatius, had learned at home to know and love Christ. Jerome himself spoke of this in terms full of admiration and compared Chromatius’ mother to the Prophetess Anna, his two sisters to the Wise Virgins of the Gospel Parable and Chromatius himself and his brother Eusebius, to the young Samuel (cf. Ep. VII: PL XXII, 341). Jerome wrote further of Chromatius and Eusebius: “Blessed Chromatius and St Eusebius were brothers by blood, no less than by the identity of their ideals” (Ep. VIII: PL XXII, 342).
After his ordination, Chromatius took part in the synod against Arianism in 381. On the death of St Valerian in 388, he was elected Bishop of Aquileia and became one of the most distinguished prelates of his time. After receiving episcopal ordination from Bishop Ambrose, he dedicated himself courageously and energetically to an immense task because of the vast territory entrusted to his pastoral care – the ecclesiastical jurisdiction of Aquileia, in fact, stretched from the present-day territories of Switzerland, Bavaria, Austria and Slovenia, as far as Hungary.
How well known and highly esteemed Chromatius was in the Church of his time, we can deduce from an episode in the life of St John Chrysostom. When the Bishop of Constantinople was exiled from his See, he wrote three letters to those he considered the most important Bishops of the Wes,t seeking to obtain their support with the Emperors – he wrote one letter to the Bishop of Rome, the second to the Bishop of Milan and the third to the Bishop of Aquileia. Those were difficult times also for Chromatius because of the precarious political situation.
Situated at one of the busiest crossroads of the Roman Empire, Aquileia was a major center of trade and commerce. Under Chromatius’ care, guidance and influence, it also became renowned as a centre of learning and orthodoxy. He baptised the monk, theologian and historian, Rufinus in his early manhood.
He kept up an extensive correspondence with both Sts Ambrose and Jerome and also with Rufinus. A scholarly theologian himself, Chromatius encouraged the Bishop of Milan to write exegetical works and also supported St Jerome in his own writings. He helped St Heliodorus of Altino to finance St Jerome’s translation of the Bible. It was also owing to Chromatius’ encouragement that Rufinus undertook the translation of Eusebius’ Ecclesiastical History and other works.
In the bitter quarrel between St Jerome and Rufinus concerning Origenism, Chromatius, while rejecting the false doctrines of Origen of Alexandria, attempted to make peace between the disputants.
St Sebastian and St Chromatius
“Chromatius was a wise teacher and a zealous shepherd. His first and main commitment was to listen to the Word, to be able to subsequently proclaim it – he always based his teaching on the Word of God and constantly returned to it. Certain subjects are particularly dear to him – first of all, the Trinitarian mystery, which he contemplated in its revelation throughout the history of salvation. Then, the theme of the Holy Spirit – Chromatius constantly reminds the faithful of the presence and action, in the life of the Church, of the Third Person of the Most Holy Trinity. But the holy Bishop returned with special insistence to the mystery of Christ. The Incarnate Word is true God and true man – He took on humanity in its totality to endow it with His own divinity. These truths, which he also reaffirmed explicitly in order to counter Arianism, were to end, up about 50 years later in the definition of the Council of Chalcedon. The heavy emphasis on Christ’s human nature led Chromatius to speak of the Virgin Mary. His Mariological doctrine is clear and precise. To him we owe evocative descriptions of the Virgin Most Holy – Mary is the “evangelical Virgin capable of accepting God”; she is the “immaculate and inviolate ewe lamb” who conceived the “Lamb clad in purple” (cf. Sermo XXIII, 3: Scrittori dell’area santambrosiana 3/1, p. 134). The Bishop of Aquileia often compares the Virgin with the Church – both, in fact, are “virgins” and “mothers.” Chromatius developed his ecclesiology above all in his commentary on Matthew. These are some of the recurring concept -: the Church is one, she is born from the Blood of Christ; she is a precious garment woven by the Holy Spirit; the Church is where the fact that Christ was born of a Virgin is proclaimed, where brotherhood and harmony flourish. One image of which Chromatius is especially fond is that of the ship in a storm – and his were stormy times, as we have heard: “There is no doubt,” the Holy Bishop says, “that this ship represents the Church” (cf. Tractatus XLII, 5: Scrittori dell’area santambrosiana 3/2, p. 260).
St Chromatius preaching
… Let us include an exhortation of Chromatius which is still perfectly applicable today: “Let us pray to the Lord with all our heart and with all our faith,” the Bishop of Aquileia recommends in one of his Sermons, “let us pray to Him to deliver us from all enemy incursions, from all fear of adversaries. Do not look at our merits but at His mercy, at Him ,who also in the past deigned to set the Children of Israel free, not for their own merits but through His mercy.May He protect us with His customary merciful love and bring about for us, what holy Moses said to the Children of Israel – The Lord will fight to defend you and you will be silent. It is He who fights, it is He who wins the victory…. And so that He may condescend to do so, we must pray as much as possible. He himself said, in fact, through the mouth of the prophet – Call on me on the day of tribulation; I will set you free and you will give me glory” (Sermo XVI, 4: Scrittori dell’area santambrosiana 3/2, pp. 100-102).
Thus, at the very beginning of the Advent Season, St Chromatius reminds us that Advent is a time of prayer in which it is essential to enter into contact with God. God knows us, He knows me, He knows each one of us, He loves me, He will not abandon me. Let us go forward with this trust in the liturgical season that has just begun.” (QUOTE – Pope Benedict XVI General Audience, 5 December 2007).
Chromatius was also an active exegete. Seventeen of his treatises on St Matthew’s Gospel survive, as well as a fine homily on the Eight Beatitudes. In all likelihood, Chromatius died in exile, in Grado, while he was attempting to escape the incursions of the Barbarians in 407, the same year in which St Chrysostom also died.
Our Lady of Liesse/Our Lady, Cause of our Joy: 2 December – An ancient statue of the Madonna and Child. It was brought from Egypt to France during the Crusades by three Knights of Malta who had been briefly captured by Saracens. It was enshrined at Liesse, diocese of Soissons. The original statue was destroyed during the French Revolution. A duplicate was installed and crowned in 1857. Patronage – Diocese of Soissons, France.
Bl Robert of Matallana St Silvanus St Pope Silverio — Greek Martyrs of Rome – (9 saints): Several Greek Christians martyred in the persecutions of Valerian – Adria, Aurelia, Eusebius, Hippolytus, Marcellus, Mary Martana, Maximus, Neon and Paulina. They were martyred by various means between 254 and 259 in Rome, Italy and are buried in the Callistus catacombs, Rome.
Martyrs of Africa – (4 saints): Four Christians martyred in Africa in the persecutions of Arian Vandals – Januarius, Securus, Severus and Victorinus.
In keeping the Blessed Virgin free from the stain of sin from the moment of her conception, God presents us with a glorious example of what mankind was meant to be. Mary is truly the second Eve, because, like Eve, she entered the world without sin. Unlike Eve, she remained sinless throughout her life—a life that she dedicated fully to the will of God.
The Immaculate Conception was not, as many people mistakenly believe, a precondition for Christ’s act of redemption but the result of it. Standing outside of time, God knew that Mary would humbly submit herself to His will and in His love for this perfect servant, He applied to her at the moment of her conception the redemption, won by Christ, that all Christians receive at their Baptism.
It is appropriate, then, that the Church has long declared the month in which the Blessed Virgin not only was conceived but gave birth to the Saviour of the world as the Month of the Immaculate Conception.
Let us Pray, this theologically rich prayer written by Ven Servant of God Pope Pius XII (1876-1958) in 1954 in honour of the 100th anniversary of the promulgation of the dogma of the Immaculate Conception.
Enraptured by the splendour of your heavenly beauty and impelled by the anxieties of the world, we cast ourselves into your arms, O Immaculate Mother of Jesus and our Mother, Mary, confident of finding in your most loving heart, appeasement of our ardent desires and a safe harbour from the tempests which beset us on every side.
Though degraded by our faults and overwhelmed by infinite misery, we admire and praise the peerless richness of sublime gifts with which God has filled you, above every other mere creature, from the first moment of your conception until the day on which, after your assumption into heaven, He crowned you Queen of the Universe.
O crystal fountain of faith, bathe our minds with the eternal truths! O fragrant Lily of all holiness, captivate our hearts with your heavenly perfume! O Conqueress of evil and death, inspire in us a deep horror of sin, which makes the soul detestable to God and a slave of hell!
O well-beloved of God, hear the ardent cry which rises up from every heart. Bend tenderly over our aching wounds. Convert the wicked, dry the tears of the afflicted and oppressed, comfort the poor and humble, quench hatreds, sweeten harshness, safeguard the flower of purity in youth, protect the holy Church, make all men feel the attraction of Christian goodness. In your name, resounding harmoniously in heaven, may they recognise that they are brothers and that the nations are members of one family, upon which, may there shine forth, the sun of a universal and sincere peace.
Receive, O most sweet Mother, our humble supplications and, above all, obtain for us that, one day, happy with you, we may repeat before your throne that hymn which today is sung on earth around your altars – You are all-beautiful, O Mary! You are the glory, you are the joy, you are the honour of our people! Amen.
Finally, having traversed the long roads and trials of the desert we have arrived in our new coastal home and after much ado, we are back online at last and I am so happy to be with you. Blessed be God as His many Graces have been poured down upon us and may He bless you all for your many prayers which so kindly accompanied us during this time.
From tomorrow, I will be back in the usual way. May we share this beautiful season of anticipation together.
In the meantime, herewith, a little reminder of the beautiful Catholic tradition of the St Andrew Novena, the Christmas Anticipation Prayer which we began yesterday and pray 15 times everyday until Christmas.
While a Novena is normally a nine-day prayer, the term is sometimes used for any prayer that is repeated over a series of days. It is an ideal Advent devotion; the First Sunday of Advent is the Sunday closest to the Feast of Saint Andrew.
The novena is not actually addressed to Saint Andrew but to God Himself, asking Him to grant our request in honour of the birth of His Son at Christmas. You can say the prayer all 15 times, all at once; or divide up the recitation as necessary (perhaps five times at each meal).
Prayed as a family, the Saint Andrew Christmas Novena is a very good way to help focus the attention of your family and children on the Advent season.
Hail and blessed be the hour and moment, in which the Son of God was born of the most pure Virgin Mary, at midnight, in Bethlehem, in the piercing cold. In that hour vouchsafe, I beseech Thee, O my God, to hear my prayer and grant my desires, ………………… [here mention your request] through the merits of Our Saviour Jesus Christ and of His blessed Mother. Amen
AnaStpaul 
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