Saints – Page 38

Venerable Alfred Pampalon: Patron of Alcoholics and Drug Addicts

Recently, a friend, Father Sean, recommended the Venerable Alfred Pampalon is the Patron of Alcoholics and Drug Addicts, on his Facebook page. I am not sure what prompted him to do, but it was a welcomed and helpful piece of information. As you know, there is a Catholic saint and blessed for every need; even those being proposed for sainthood have causes to mind. Today is the anniversary of death of Father Alfred Pampalon.

For me, this is a great “find.” Why? Because for the last year my sister has been possessed by her addiction to alcohol. To date, she’s been brought to the hospital for various reasons: alcohol induced seizures, ulcers, depression and the like. Alcohol is truly an insidious disease. With this so personal experience I am humbled and moved by the fragility of those who carry such a cross as alcoholism and depression. In many ways my sister’s cross is an opening for grace to enter more deeply into my own sinful life. So, I am happy to know of Father Alfred and his patronage. Through his intercession I am hoping for a healing for my sister and my family, but also for others who carry this disease inside them. Alcohol and the related problems are a real cross to bear; Alfred’s was TB as was the residual set of health complications. But it is said that he had a burning desire to help his people know (meet) Jesus and to lighten the burden of those whose cross so very heavy to bear.

Father Alfred Pampalon (24 November 1867 – 30 September 1896), born in French Canada. Father Alfred was a Redemptorist priest who studied in Belgium. Father Alfred is known as a great apostle of the Saint Anne de Beaupré shrine. He died very young at the age of 28 of TB. his cause for canonization was opened and he was recognized has having heroic virtue. Thus he was declared Venerable Servant of God, May 14 1991, by Pope John Paul II.

Dear Father Alfred, listen to my cry and come to my aid. Obtain for me the favors I desire. You are well known as the protector of people who are suffering in body, mind and spirit.

You show special compassion for alcoholics and drug addicts. You have freed so many people from their dependencies. Free NN. (me) also, I beg you, dear Father Alfred, and free those people I recommend to you, especially members of my family.

I come to you with confidence. I pray for myself and for all those who are dear to me. Come also to the assistance of the Church and of the whole world. Amen.

Father Alfred realized clearly that “There is no virtue without prayer.” Here is a novena of prayers.

Dom Antoine Marie, OSB, monk of the French Abbey of Saint-Joseph de Clairval, writes extensive biographies of the saints for his abbey’s newsletter. If you are interested, here is entry for Father Alfred.

Saint Lorenzo Ruiz

Today is the feast of Saint Lorenzo Ruiz, the first Filipino saint.

With the Church we pray,

Grant us, we pray, Lord God, the same perseverance shown by your Martyrs Saint Lawrence Ruiz and his companions in serving you and their neighbor, since those persecuted for the sake of righteousness are blessed in your Kingdom.

Lorenzo was a layman, a husband and a father; he was educated by the Dominican friars and a member of the Third Order. He was especially devoted, as you’d expect for someone connected to the Order of Preachers, to the rosary. Because he was unwilling to renounce his faith in Christ, he tortured and later suffered martyred with 14 others for the faith. Lorenzo Ruiz was canonized by John Paul in 1987.

Saint Vincent de Paul

The prayers for the Mass of Saint Vincent de Paul today have us focus on “the relief of the poor and the formation of the clergy” imitating what Vincent loved and did in following the Savior. The Church’s mission is one of service and education. Baptized into the company of saints, all Christians ought to have concern for the least in society; likewise, the baptized are to be concerned for their own education in the faith aiming to be as Saint Paul said, mature Christians. In Vincent’s world, education of the faithful came through the formation of healthy and holy clergy. An uneducated, that is, an untrained clergyman can lead others to perdition.

“Charity is the cement which binds communities to God and persons to one another in such a way that whoever contributes to union of hearts in a Company binds it indissolubly to God.” (Coste II, Letter 651, p. 413)

Saint Vincent said in his common rules as noted by Vincentian Father José María Román:

Charitable behaviour towards the neighbor should always be characteristic of us. We should try, then: 1) to behave towards others in the way we might reasonably expect to be treated by them; 2) to agree with others, and to accept everything in the Lord; 3) to put up with one another without grumbling; 4) to weep with those who weep; 5) to rejoice with those who rejoice; 6) to yield precedence to one another; 7) to be kind and helpful to one another in all sincerity.

Hence, Vincent stressed three attitudes for his companions in the Congregation of the Mission and the Daughters of Charity, but they are also applicable to us who are not Vincentians, namely: mutual respect, condescension (humility) and bearing with the weaknesses of our neighbors.

Our prayer today ought to note how we engage in concrete works of charity, spiritual and corporal, and how we attend to our education in the faith while supporting those preparing to serve the world as Catholic priests.

The Vincentians need our prayers, so, I’d like to remember the Fathers of the Congregation of the Mission who serve in the Archdiocese of Hartford, especially those at St Stanislaus Church, New Haven, CT.

I’d recommend reading St Vincent de Paul: A Biography by Father José María Román, CM (London, 1999), but the same author has published various aspects of Saint Vincent’s life and work online.

Saints Andrew Kim Taegon, Paul Chong Hasang and companions

The Church remembers the martyrdom of the Korean martyrs, more than 103 of them. The names of Andrew Kim Taegon and Paul Chong Hasang are the hallmarks for this 19th century Christian witness. I can’t fathom the depth of love and hope these martyrs must have had in facing trials.

With the Church we pray,

O God, who have been pleased to increase your adopted children in all the world, and who made the blood of the Martyrs Saint Andrew Tae-gon and his companions a most fruitful seed of Christians, grant that we may be defended by their help and profit always from their example.

My 2011 blog post on today’s feast gives more information.

At Mass today at the Monastery of the Glorious Cross (Branford, CT), Father David Borino remembered the intentions of Sister Maria Kim, OSB, a nun of this monastery. In addition, I’d like to remember in prayer the Benedictine monks of Saints Maurus and Placidus Abbey, (Waegwan, Korea), St Paul’s Abbey (Newton, NJ), Archbishop Andrew Yeom Soo-jung of Seoul, Nicholas Cardinal Cheong Jin-Suk (archbishop emeritus of Seoul) and the Korean community in Queens, especially my friends Claire and Theresa. May the Divine Majesty richly bless these servants of God.

Saint John Chrysostom: learn to honor Christ as he wants honor

Today’s saint of the Eastern Church, Saint John Chrysostom (c. 347-407), a fourth century bishop and Doctor of the Church, known as an eloquent speaker and teacher of the faith hence beings nicknamed the golden tongue of the faith. His homilies, as you will note below, are insightful. Because of the tensions with the political leaders John was exiled several times and ultimately died of exhaustion. Among the churches, Saint John has four different feast days.

One his meditations on the Gospel of Matthew found in the Office of Readings follows:

Would you honor the body of Christ? Do not despise his nakedness; do not honor him here in church clothed in silk vestments and then pass him by unclothed and frozen outside. Remember that he who said, ‘This is my Body’, and made good his words, also said, ‘You saw me hungry and gave me no food’, and, ‘in so far as you did it not to one of these, you did it not to me’. In the first sense the body of Christ does not need clothing but worship from a pure heart. In the second sense it does need clothing and all the care we can give it.

We must learn to be discerning Christians and to honor Christ in the way in which he wants to be honored. It is only right that honor given to anyone should take the form most acceptable to the recipient not to the giver. Peter thought he was honoring the Lord when he tried to stop him washing his feet, but this was far from being genuine homage. So give God the honor he asks for, that is give your money generously to the poor. God has no need of golden vessels but of golden hearts.

I am not saying you should not give golden altar vessels and so on, but I am insisting that nothing can take the place of almsgiving. The Lord will not refuse to accept the first kind of gift but he prefers the second, and quite naturally, because in the first case only the donor benefits, in the second case the poor gets the benefit. The gift of a chalice may be ostentatious; almsgiving is pure benevolence.

What is the use of loading Christ’s table with gold cups while he himself is starving? Feed the hungry and then if you have any money left over, spend it on the altar table. Will you make a cup of gold and without a cup of water? What use is it to adorn the altar with cloth of gold hangings and deny Christ a coat for his back! What would that profit you? Tell me: if you saw someone starving and refused to give him any food but instead spent your money on adorning the altar with gold, would he thank you? Would he not rather be outraged? Or if you saw someone in rags and stiff with cold and then did not give him clothing but set up golden columns in his honor, would he not say that he was being made a fool of and insulted?

Consider that Christ is that tramp who comes in need of a night’s lodging. You turn him away and then start laying rugs on the floor, draping the walls, hanging lamps on silver chains on the columns. Meanwhile the tramp is locked up in prison and you never give him a glance. Well again I am not condemning munificence in these matters. Make your house beautiful by all means but also look after the poor, or rather look after the poor first. No one was ever condemned for not adorning his house, but those who neglect the poor were threatened with hellfire for all eternity and a life of torment with devils. Adorn your house if you will, but do not forget your brother in distress. He is a temple of infinitely greater value.

Blessed Stella and companions, Martyrs of Nowogródek

O most blessed Trinity, we praise and thank you for the example of Blessed Mary Stella and her 10 Companions, Sisters of the Holy Family of Nazareth, who by imitating Jesus Christ, offered themselves as a sacrifice of love.

God of mercy and compassion, through the merits of their martyrdom and by their intercession, grant us the grace we humbly ask… (insert intention here) …so that like them, we may witness with our lives to the presence of the Kingdom of God’s love and extend it to the human family throughout the world. We ask this through Christ, our Lord. Amen.

Blessed Martyred Sisters of Nowogródek, pray for us.

This 2011 icon is in the spiritual treasure of Father Michael Bechard, a priest of the Diocese of London, Ontario.

Saint Gregory the Great

When the Church prays the Mass and the Divine Office today we’ll ask God to hear in the “intercession of Pope Saint Gregory, [to] endow, we pray, with a spirit of wisdom those to whom you have given authority to govern, that the flourishing of a holy flock may become the eternal joy of the shepherds.”

We rely on Saint Gregory’s intercession in a big way today.

We are reminded by Pope Saint Gregory that “The only true riches are those that make us rich in virtue. Therefore, if you want to be rich, beloved, love true riches. If you aspire to the heights of real honor, strive to reach the kingdom of Heaven. If you value rank and renown, hasten to be enrolled in the heavenly court of the Angels.”

Gregory (540 – 604) was born in Rome and was a civil servant, the usual path for a man of an aristocratic family; he became Rome’s Prefect.

In time, Gregory became a monk and then he founded a monasteries in Rome and in Sicily. As a deacon he was sent as an envoy to Constantinople.

History tells us that Gregory was the first monk –likely to be living the Rule of Benedict– to be elected Pope. His papacy was reform-minded when it came to property, service, concern for the poor and marginalized, the Church’s liturgical life, including sacred music. You can say that Gregory had a working relationship with people in tension with the Church, especially the Barbarians threatening the peace of peoples.

Beside his prodigious intellectual and social work, Gregory ought to be remembered in a significant way for setting the course of evangelizing the English peoples when he sent Augustine and his monks to England in 596.

The Passion of Saint John the Baptist

As forerunner of our Lord’s birth, preaching and death, the blessed John showed in his struggle a goodness worthy of the sight of heaven. In the words of Scripture: Though in the sight of men he suffered torments, his hope is full of immortality. We justly commemorate the day of his birth with a joyful celebration, a day which he himself made festive for us through his suffering and which he adorned with the crimson splendor of his own blood. We do rightly revere his memory with joyful hearts, for he stamped with the seal of martyrdom the testimony which he delivered on behalf of our Lord.

Saint Bede the Venerable
Office of Readings

In an era where nihilism is prevalent, hearing that someone is full of hope for immortality is striking. What does Saint Bede mean? We know from experience that the life we live is full of contradictions and divisions in mind and heart. But we have today a man who knows his humanity and the truth of a promise that only Someone else can make good. Losing one’s head in this world allows for the soul to truly live in the next.

Saint Augustine of Hippo

Saint Augustine was born in Tagaste, Souk-Ahras, Algeria on November 13, 354 to Patricius, a pagan, and Monica, a fervent Catholic. We liturgically observed Saint Monica’s feast yesterday.

We know from his writings and the witness of many others that Augustine was endowed with brilliant human, intellectual and spiritual gifts which lead him on a wild pilgrimage of heart and mind.

Following his education, Augustine was an accomplished rhetorician and teacher in Africa, Rome and Milan. His faith journey began with his mother Monica when he was a child but he didn’t complete his theological formation and wasn’t baptized for many years. In fact, he adopted the Manichean heresy as an intellectual lens to judge reality. But as we know from his Testimony, Augustine discerned moments of spiritual growth he decided to embrace Jesus Christ fully Catholic. By this time his common law wife named Una by scholars and who bore him a son, had departed. Conversion meant that marriage was not possible for him.

The gift of Baptism was given him by Saint Ambrose in Milan in 387. It is said that together with his son and some friends, he returned with them to Tagaste to begin a monastic life. While the ministerial priesthood was not in his personal discernment, the Church had decided that Augustine’s vocation was to serve as a priest in Hippo in 391, and later a bishop of that See in 397. Augustine’s ordination was lived lived in the monastic context.

Augustine was a prolific writer, an accomplished preacher, a monastic leader, a theologian, pastor, contemplative, and mystic. On this date in 430 at nearly 76 years of age, with North Africa being invaded by the Vandals and the Church devastated. Augustine mortal remains were first taken to Sardinia and later to Pavia, Italy, where they are now rest in the Basilica of San Pietro in Ciel d’Oro.

Saint Monica

Son, nothing in this world now affords me delight. I do not know what there is now for me to do or why I am still here, all my hopes in this world being now fulfilled.

Saint Monica about the conversion of Augustine

Saint Monica gives hope to mothers (parents and family) that perseverance in prayer and friendship does influence others. Good witness can’t be exchanged for anything else. Monica realized, no doubt, that her son, as bright as he was, had free will and that even God respected that fact. What does that say about praying in singular way, for the conversion of someone for 30+ years? It says that our heart and mind expands and makes room of God’s grace to come in new and unexpected ways.

Saint Monica, pray for us.