Saints – Page 10

St Phocas the Gardener

Today we remember St. Phocas the Gardener. He is the patron of farmers, fieldworkers, agriculture, and gardeners. He was a man connected to his land and to his neighbor, and who understood ecology in the deep sense of not living just for oneself but for all. He was both a bishop and a simple farmer, and he devoted everything he grew to be given to the poor.

He is also the patron of hospitality. When soldiers came looking for him to execute him for being a Christian, he welcomed them with open arms, and practicing the command of Christ to love one’s enemies, he fed them and treated them as Christ himself. The soldiers did not realize that their host was the same Phocas they were to execute, and St. Phocas promised them that he would help them find their target.

When Phocas revealed himself to them, they were reluctant to kill him. Phocas, however, refused to fight them or to hinder their duty, and instead invited the soldiers to do what they were there to do, offering his neck. For this he was martyred.

St. Phocas is also the patron of sailers. There is an old sailing custom whereby at each meal, a portion is set aside called ‘St. Phocas portion.’ This portion is sold and the money collected is donated to the poor whenever port is reached. In this way, Phocas’ love for strangers, enemies, the poor, the land, and his neighbors continued to extend even past his death.

Holy Phocas, pray for us!

thanks to In Communion

Saints Peter and Paul

The present reading from the holy gospel (John 21:15-19) commends to us the virtue of perfect love. Perfect love is that by which we are ordered to love the Lord with our whole heart, our whole soul and our whole strength, and our neighbor as ourselves. Neither of these two kinds of love is capable of being perfect without the other, because God cannot be loved apart from our neighbor, nor our neighbor apart from God.

Hence as many times as Peter was asked by our Lord if he loved him, and he answered that he was a witness that he loved him, the Lord added at the end of each inquiry feed my sheep or feed my lambs, as if he were clearly saying ‘there is only one true proof of wholehearted love of God-if you strive to exercise care by laboring solicitously on behalf of your brothers.’

Now whoever neglects to commit himself to practicing the work of piety toward his brother to the extent of his ability shows that he loves his Maker less than he should, for he is scorning Christ’s commandment concerning support of his neighbor in his time of need.

Bede the Venerable

Homily for Sts. Peter and Paul

St Joan of Arc

Joan of Arc was not stuck at the cross-roads, either by rejecting all the paths like Tolstoy, or by accepting them all like Nietzsche. She chose a path, and went down it like a thunderbolt. — GK Chesterton, Orthodoxy

St Rita of Cascia

The liturgical memorial of St. Rita of Cascia (1381-1457) is today. Several years ago when I was visiting a friend in Italy we visited the Benedictine monks at Norcia and by surprise, we were taken to Cascia to venerate the relics of St. Rita and imbibe the monastic house. At that time I didn’t really have a devotion to St. Rita even though her personal narrative is quite interesting; only recently two friends, independent of one another, told me of St Rita’s love and affection for honey bees. As a beekeeper I am always looking for divine intercession as I care for the bees.

Due various things in her life, Rita eventually became an Augustinian nun giving witness to the meaning of forgiveness, prayer, humility, patience, and perseverance. She dedicated her life to heroic charity and penance as she closely united herself and her life of deep suffering to Christ. Notice in the image that Rita has something in her forehead. While praying before a crucifix, St. Rita mystically received a thorn in her forehead (stigmata) from Jesus’ Crown of Thorns.

St. Rita is the patron saint of impossible causes, difficult marriages, abuse victims, and honey bees. Can we model St. Rita’s perseverance today?

Recalling St Gianna’s canonization

Today in 2004, Pope Saint John Paul II canonized Gianna Beretta Molla. Our patron saint is an incredible witness and builder of peace. Saint Gianna’s feast day is April 28.

Saint Gianna is not only a holy person in love with her Savior, but a wife, mother, and physician who continues to show us that it possible to follow the Gospel closely and faithfully. She is known as a patron for ProLife work and marriage. In fact, our pregnancy resource center in New Haven (CT) is named for this great woman and disciple of Jesus, Saint Gianna.

The sainted pope said in his homily:

… simple, but more than ever, significant messenger of divine love. In a letter to her future husband a few days before their marriage, she wrote: “Love is the most beautiful sentiment the Lord has put into the soul of men and women”.

Following the example of Christ, who “having loved his own… loved them to the end” (Jn 13: 1), this holy mother of a family remained heroically faithful to the commitment she made on the day of her marriage. The extreme sacrifice she sealed with her life testifies that only those who have the courage to give of themselves totally to God and to others are able to fulfil themselves.

Through the example of Gianna Beretta Molla, may our age rediscover the pure, chaste and fruitful beauty of conjugal love, lived as a response to the divine call!

Blesseds John Rochester and James Walworth

Today in the Roman Martyrology, the Church gives us feast of Blesseds John Rochester and James Walworth: English Catholic priests, Carthusian monks, and martyrs of the Protestant Reformation—hanged at York on this day in 1537, after refusing to sign King Henry VIII’s Oath of Supremacy.

Pope Leo XIII beatified the Fathers in 1888.

You may want to read the description of the painting about Fathers Rochester and Walworth here.

Can we give our lives to Christ and the Church in the way that Blesseds John and James did?

St Simeon of Thessalonica

On the Eastern liturgical calendar we have our father among the saints, Simeon, Archbishop of Thessalonica. The Liturgy speaks of Simeon in this manner:

By the light of your wisdom and virtue, O holy father, Simeon, the spirit of God revealed you as a true shepherd of Salonica and a divinely inspired master of the mysteries of grace. Because of this, we look upon you as a teacher sent by God himself, and in our joy we exclaim: Glory to Christ for glorifying you. Glory to him who crowned you. Glory to him who gives us grace through you.

The point of the troparion is to highlight Simeon’s gifts of being a shepherd and a teacher of the divine mysteries. Gifts we ought to beg the Holy Spirit to bestow upon us. The faith community is desperate to have great shepherds and teachers again! Yet, St Simeon has often gifts we aspire to live by.

A New Skete hagiographical sketch of the archbishop says thus. “Simeon was a native of Constantinople, where he also became a monk. In 1416 he was made archbishop of Thessalonica. During most of his episcopate, the city was under a vise-like threat from Venetians on one side and Turks on the other. In those years of turmoil, all looked to Simeon for his pastoral prudence and courage under stress.

Simeon was a successor to Gregory Palamas in the see of Thessalonica, and heir to his theology, refracted through the humanism of Nicholas Cavasilas: “He was the noblest of the latter’s pupils. Simeon never claimed to be a mystic himself, but like his master, he believed that the highest mystical experience was to be found in the liturgy. And though he argued against the Latins, he clearly longed to reach an understanding with them. His peacemaking attitude and compassionate administration made him so well loved in his diocese that when he died, six years after the city had been sold to the Venetians and four months before it fell to the Turks, not only did the Italians mourn him along with the Greeks, but the Jews, a race that seldom had cause to love Byzantine hierarchs, joined sincerely in the mourning.

From Simeon’s writings we have descriptions of the last use of the cathedral rites of Byzantium, which in his day had been replaced in Constantinople herself by Palestinian monastic forms. While the archbishop lamented the change, he made practical pastoral adjustments in his own churches to accommodate the new forms.

In addition to his liturgical works, his writing spanned political, historical, canonical, dogmatic, apologetic, moral, and pastoral themes as well. He may be considered the last true theologian of the Byzantine period.

After his death in September, 1429, he was revered by many as a saint. But, perhaps because of the centuries of Turkish occupation, it was not until modern times that he was officially canonized. This occurred in his own cathedral in Thessalonica in 1981.

Ite ad Joseph

Today is the Feast of St. Joseph. We know him to be the earthly father of Jesus, chaste spouse of the Blessed Virgin, a just and wise man, a man of obedience to the Divine Will, the patron of good and holy death, and the patron of the Universal Church. He is the patron saint of fathers. One priest said, St Joseph “provides the example of caring for God’s people on earth – that with a quiet patience and devoted obedience of service and love to those under his care.”

When it comes may we, too, die in the arms of Jesus and Mary with Joseph holding our hand. By example we strive to follow St Joseph to our Savior.

Let us recall what St. Alphonsus Liguori taught:
“We should, indeed, honor St. Joseph, since the Son of God himself was graciously pleased to honor him by calling him father. The Holy Scriptures speak of him as the father of Jesus. ‘His father and mother were marveling at the things spoken concerning Him’. Mary also used this name: ‘in sorrow your father and I have been seeking you’. If, then, the King of Kings was pleased to raise Joseph to so high a dignity, it is right on our part to endeavor to honor him as much as we can.”

St Cyril of Jerusalem

Today, we liturgically honor our father among the saints, Cyril, patriarch of Jerusalem. Cyril was listed as one of the fathers at the Second Ecumenical Council in 381 in Constantinople. He was pastor of the Holy City for nearly half a century, and twice suffered exile. He left a rich legacy in his Catechetical Lectures. He delivered these to those preparing for baptism at Easter and they gave form to the period we now call Lent. They contain a wealth of information about the rite of Baptism and the Eucharistic Liturgy where we find the earliest mention of the invocation of the Holy Spirit. The annual commemoration of Holy Week and Pascha formalized during his rule, thru the natural popularity of pilgrimages to Jerusalem, spread the basic structure of these sacred feasts throughout the entire Church. This is amply evident in the journal of Egeria whose visit occurred soon after Cyril’s death on this day in 386. (t:NS) St Cyril is a Doctor of the Church.

Those who are serious students of the Liturgy, Eastern or Western, have always loved the St Cyril’s work on the sacraments of initiation, among many other things. “Make your fold with the sheep; flee from the wolves: depart not from the Church”. I am grateful for St Cyril of Jerusalem!

St. Josephine Bakhita

Blessed Feast Day of St. Josephine Bakhita.

May she always intercede for us, especially those caught in the web of human trafficking!

The matter of human trafficking is finally getting to attention by those outside of law enforcement officials. The Church has know about this crime and sin but has not made too many in-roads to change the system. Together, the state and Church ought to work for those involved with human trafficking.