Saint Columba of Cordova, also known as Columba of Cordoba and Columba of Spain, martyr. She is a part of the Martyrs of Córdoba. Born to a pious family in the 8th century, Columba’s brother was an abbot, and her sister and brother-in-law founded a double monastery at Tabanos, Spain. Her mother wanted her to marry, but Columba was drawn to religious life, and entered her sister’s monastery at Tabanos.
During the Moorish persecutions of Christians in 852, most of the nuns of Tabanos fled to Cordova. Columba refused to run, and made a public proclamation of her faith to a Moorish magistrate and denounced Muhammed and his law. The magistrate condemned her to be beheaded on September 17, 853. Her body was thrown into the Guadalquivir Marshes, but was recovered by other Christians and buried at the basilica of St. Eulalia at Fragellas. Her relics were taken later to and venerated at two churches, the abbey of Santa Maria de Nájera and to its dependent priory, which was dedicated to Saint Columba.
The fortified Santa María la Real of Nájera
Neither can I call myself anything else than what I am, a Christian.
St Robert Bellarmine SJ (1542-1621) Doctor of the Church, Bishop, Confessor, Theologian, Professor, Writer, Preacher, Mediator. (Optional Memorial) Feast day – 13 May (General Roman Calendar, 1932–1969)
Stigmata of St Francis of Assisi: Two years before the great Saint Francis of Assisi died and when he was forty-two years old — one year after he had built the first crib in honour of Our Lord — he went off to a lonely mountain called Mount Alvernia, to prepare himself by forty days of fasting and prayer for the Feast of Saint Michael, the greatest of God’s Angels, whose Feast day is 29 September. On the Feast of the Exaltation of the Holy Cross on 14 September, Saint Francis received in his hands, feet and side the Sacred Wounds from Our Lord’s own body.
Never was a Saint more beautifully loved by Jesus than Saint Francis of Assisi. The wounds Jesus gave him stayed in his hands, feet and side and continually bled for two more years, until he died in 1226. The day on which Saint Francis received the Five Wounds of Our Lord was 14 September but so, that this beautiful event might have a feast day for itself, the Stigmata of Saint Francis is commemorated today, on 17 September. The simple liturgy of this holy Saint’s life might be put this way – the crib in 1223 and the Cross in 1224.
St Agathoclia St Brogan of Ross Tuirc St Columba of Cordova St Crescentio of Rome St Emmanuel Nguyen Van Trieu St Flocellus
St Hildegard von Bingen OSB (1098-1179) Doctor of the Church, German Benedictine Abbess, Theologian, Writer, Composer, Philosopher, Poet, Mystic, Visionary, Founder, Scientist, Artist and Polymath. She is considered to be the founder of scientific natural history in Germany.
St Justin of Rome
St Lambert (c 635-c 700) Bishop & Martyr, Bishop of Maastricht, Confessor, Missionary.
St Narcissus of Rome St Peter Arbues OSA (1442-1485) Priest Martyr St Rodingus St Satyrus of Milan St Socrates Bl Stanislaus of Jesus and Mary St Stephen of England St Theodora St Uni of Bremen St Zygmunt Sajna
St Zygmunt Szcesny Felinski TOSF (1822-1895) Archbishop of Warsaw and founder of the Franciscan Sisters of the Family of Mary, Apostle of poor, Confessor, Professor, Writer, Reformer.
Martyred in the Spanish Civil War • Blessed Álvaro Santos Cejudo Moreno Chocano • Blessed Juan Ventura Solsona • Blessed Timoteo Valero Pérez
Our Morning Offering – 17 September – “Month of the Seven Sorrows of the Blessed Virgin Mary ”
Morning Offering May Every Beat of My Heart Be a Prayer By St Mary Euphrasia Pelletier (1796-1868)
O my God, may every beat of my heart, be a prayer, to obtain grace and pardon for sinners. May all my sighs be so many appeals to Your infinite mercy. May each look have the virtue to gain to Your love, those souls, whom I shall look on. May the food of my life, be to work without ceasing for Your glory and the salvation of souls. Amen
One Minute Reflection – 17 September – “Month of the Seven Sorrows of the Blessed Virgin Mary ” – Readings: Ps 85:3; 85:5, Ps 85:1, Eph 3:13-21, Luke 14:1-11
But when you are invited go and recline in the last place; that when he who invited you comes in, he may say to you, ‘Friend, go up higher!’
Luke 14:1-11
REFLECTION –“You spread a table before me in the sight of my foes” What more could we desire? Why would we choose the places of honor? Whatever place we occupy, we have everything in abundance and lack nothing. But you who want to have the place of honor, whoever you might be, go and sit in the lowest place. Do not let your knowledge make your head swell with pride; do not allow yourself to be exalted by means of your reputation. Instead, the greater you are, the more you must humble yourself in everything and “you will find favor with God”, so much so that at the favorable time he will say to you: “My friend, come up higher,” and “this will win you the esteem of your fellow guests.”
Most certainly, so far as it depended on him, Moses occupied the lowest place. When the Lord wanted to send him to the children of Israel and invited him to come higher, he answered: “If you please, Lord, send someone else, for I am slow of speech.” It is as though he had said: “I am not worthy of such a high function.” Saul also considered himself to be a man of humble condition when the Lord made him king. And in the same way, Jeremiah, afraid to go up to the place of honor, said: “Ah, Lord God! I do not know how to speak; I am too young.” It is thus through humility, not pride, through the virtues, not money that we must seek to occupy the place of honor.
St Bruno of Segni
PRAYER – Heavenly Father, help me to be holy in the way that You have laid out for me. Let me carry out my duties of my state of life to the full and grant me the grace to carry my crosses in honour of You. Only in You may I attain holiness, learning to give myself, my will, my heart and my soul only to You. Mary Holy Sorrowful Virgin and Glorious Mother of Christ Jesus, we ask for your intercession. We make our prayer in unity with Our Lord Jesus Christ and the Holy Spirit, one with You, now and forever, amen.
For in the first place, that a manifest heretic would be ipso facto deposed, is proven from authority and reason. A non-Christian cannot in any way be Pope, as Cajetan affirms in the same book, and the reason is because he cannot be the head of that which he is not a member, and he is not a member of the Church who is not a Christian. But a manifest heretic is not a Christian, as St. Cyprian and many other Fathers clearly teach. Therefore, a manifest heretic cannot be Pope….
The school of Christ is the school of love. In the last day, when the general examination takes place … Love will be the whole syllabus.
It is granted to few, to recognise the true Church, amidst the darkness, of so many schisms and heresies and, to fewer still, so to love the Truth which they have seen, as to fly to it’s embrace!
Even in a world which is being shipwrecked, remain brave and strong.
All of creation is a song of praise to God.
Holy Spirit, the life that gives life: You are the Cause of all movement. You are the Breath of all creatures. You are the Salve that purifies our souls. You are the Ointment that heals our wounds. You are the Fire that warms our hearts. You are the Light that guides our feet. Let all the world praise You!
Reflections on each of the Seven Dolors of Mary by St Alphonsus Liguori
The Piercing of the Side of Jesus and His Descent From the Cross
And now we are to consider to-day the sixth dolor which afflicted this sorrowful mother. Attend and weep. Hitherto the dolors of Mary tortured her one by one, but to-day they are all united to assail her.
That the joy of the following Paschal Sabbath should not be disturbed, the Jews wished the body of Jesus to be taken down from the cross; but because they could not take down a criminal until he was dead, they came with iron mallets to break his legs, as they had already done to the two thieves crucified with him. And Mary, while she remains weeping at the death of her Son, sees those armed men coming towards her Jesus. At this sight she first trembled with fear, then she said : Ah, my Son is already dead, cease to maltreat him, and cease to torture me a poor mother longer. She implored them not to break his legs : “Oravit eos, ne frangerent crura,” as St. Bonaventure writes. But while she is thus speaking, oh, God she sees a soldier with violence brandishing a spear, and piercing the side of Jesus : “One of the soldiers with a spear opened his side, and immediately there came out blood and water.” The cross shook at the stroke of the spear, and, as was revealed to St. Bridget, the heart of Jesus was divided : “Ita ut ambae paries essent divisse.” There came out blood and water, for only a few drops of blood remained, and those also the Saviour wished to shed, in order to show that he had no more blood to give us. The injury of that stroke was offered to Jesus, but the pain was inflicted on Mary: Christ, says the devout Lanspergius, shared with his mother the infliction of that wound, for he received the insult and his mother the pain. The holy Fathers explain this to be the very sword predicted to the Virgin by St. Simeon ; a sword, not of iron, but of grief, which pierced through her blessed soul in the heart of Jesus, where it always dwelt. Thus, among others, Si. Bernard says: The spear which opened his side passed through the soul of the Virgin, which could not be torn from the heart of Jesus. And the divine mother herself revealed the same to St. Bridget, saying: When the spear was drawn out, the point appeared red with blood; then I felt as if my heart were pierced when I saw the heart of my most dear Son pierced.” The angel told St. Bridget, that such were the sufferings of Mary, that she was saved from death only by the miraculous power of God. In her other dolors she at least had her Son to compassionate her; and now she had not even him to take pity on her.
The afflicted mother, still fearing that other injuries might be inflicted on her Son, entreats Joseph of Arimathea to obtain from Pilate the body of her Jesus, that at least after his death she may be able to guard it and protect it from injuries. Joseph went to Pilate, and made known to him the sorrow and the wish of this afflicted mother; and St. Anselm thinks that compassion for the mother softened the heart of Pilate, and moved him to grant her the body. of the Saviour. And now Jesus is taken from the cross. Oh most holy Virgin, after thou with so great love hadst given thy Son to the world for our salvation, behold the world returns him to thee again! But oh, my God, how dost thou return him to me? said Mary to the world. My Son was white and ruddy: “Dilectus meus candidus et rubicundus:” but thou hast returned him to me blackened with bruises, and red, not with a ruddy color, but with the wounds thou hast inflicted upon him; he was beautiful, now there is no more beauty in him; he is all deformity. All were enamored with his aspect, now he excites horror in all who look upon him. Oh, how many swords, says St. Bonaventure, pierced the soul of this mother, when she received the body of her Son after it was taken from the cross: ” O quot gladii animam matris pertransierunt!” Let us consider what anguish it would cause any mother to receive the lifeless body of a son!
She sees his mouth open, his eye shut, she examines the lacerated flesh, and those exposed bones; she takes off the crown, and sees the cruel injury made by those thorns, in that sacred head; she looks upon those pierced hands and feet, and says: Ah, my Son, to what has the love thou didst bear to men reduced thee!But what evil hath thou done to them, that they have treated thee so cruelly. Thou wast my Father, Bernardino de Bustis imagines her to say, my brother, my spouse, my delight, my glory, my all. Oh, my Son, behold how I am afflicted, look upon me and console me; but thou dost look upon me no more. Speak, speak to me but one word, and console me; but thou dost speak no more, for thou art dead. Then turning to those barbarous instruments, she said: Oh cruel thorns, oh nails, oh merciless spear, how could you thus torture your Creator? But what thorns, what nails? Alas! sinners, she exclaimed, it is you who have thus cruelly treated my Son.
Thus Mary spoke and complained of us. But if now she were capable of suffering, what would she say? What grief would she feel to see that men after the death of her Son, continue to torment and crucify him by their sins? Let us no longer give pain to this sorrowful mother; and if we also have hither to grieved her by our sins, let us now do what she directs. She says to us: Return, ye transgressors, to the heart: “Redite, prsevaricatores, ad cor.” Sinners, return to the wounded heart of my Jesus; return as penitents, for he will receive you. Flee from him to him, she continues to say with Guerric the Abbot; from the Judge to the Redeemer, from the tribunal to the cross.
The Virgin herself revealed to St. Bridget that she closed the eyes of her Son, when he was taken down from the cross, but she could not close his arms: “Ejus brachia flectere non potui.” Jesus Christ giving us to understand by this, that he desired to remain with open arms to receive all penitent sinners who return to him. Oh world, continues Mary, behold, then, thy time is the time of lovers.
AnaStpaul 
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