(A Sarum text)
The people of Sicily and northern Europe especially remember Saint Lucy as their heavenly patron and friend. I have a particular fondness for her because Saint Lucy is an early martyr of the Church and because an aunt and uncle lived with physical blindness.
We pray at Mass with these words…
May the glorious intercession of the Virgin and Martyr Saint Lucy give heart, we pray, O Lord, so that we may celebrate her heavenly birthday in this present age and so behold things eternal.
Hermina Tharway, 12, prepares for exams at Santa Lucia, a home for blind people in Abou, Egypt (image by Holly Pickett).
The Santa Lucia Home — named in honor of the patron saint of the blind — was built with funds from CNEWA’s donors and houses ten girls and eight boys from ages 8 to 18. The children do not attend school next door, which is not equipped to teach the blind. Rather, they are enrolled in public programs in other areas of the city. The boys attend El Nour School in Alexandria’s Muharram Bey neighborhood, while the girls attend a similar school in the Zizina area.
Sister Souad and her colleague, Sister Hoda Chaker Assal, rouse the children every morning for breakfast, baths and a 7:45 date with the school bus.
“Here we wake them and prepare them for school, we feed them and do their laundry and we tuck them in at night and make sure they get a good rest,” says Sister Souad. “It is just like at home.”
For more from this story see, Blind to Limitations.
h/t to One to One, the blog of Catholic Near East Welfare Association
A relatively obscure saint on our liturgical calendar, as many are, but here in the USA while Saint Juan Diego (1774-1548) is not as well-known as he ought to be, those who recognize him know that he famous for being an instrument of Divine Providence. He discerned God’s will and lived his life as though he really belonged to Jesus Christ. He is the first native American to be raised to the altar. As Pope John Paul said, Juan Diego shed light on the divine path to salvation. Pray and closely read the prayer used at Mass below.
The liturgical memorial of Saint Nicholas observed today is an opportunity to reflect on our reliance on others as we go onto the Lord as a community, people who have regard for another. The sainted bishop Nicholas of Myra (Turkey) reminds us of our reception of unmerited grace given by God.
Let us pray for sailors, orphans and pawnbrokers. I’d also like to remember Melkite Bishop Nicholas Samra on his feast day.
At their annual
meeting, the US bishops voted to have add to the US liturgical calendar Blessed
John Paul II and Blessed Marianne Cope, both are optional liturgical memorials
in the proper of saints. October 22 is designated to honor Blessed John Paul and January 23
for Mother Marianne.
Pope Saint Leo the
Great stated: “The faith of those who live their faith is a serene faith. What
you long for will be given you; what you love will be yours for ever. Since it
is by giving alms that everything is pure for you, you will also receive that
blessing which is promised next by the Lord: the Godhead that no man has been
able to see. In the inexpressible joy of this eternal vision, human nature will
possess what eye has not seen or ear heard, what man’s heart has never
conceived.”
Preserve in the midst of your people, we ask, O
Lord, the spirit with which you filled the Bishop Saint Charles Borromeo, that
your Church may be constantly renewed and, by conforming herself to the
likeness of Christ, may show his face to the world.
O God, who by the blessed Apostles have brought us to
acknowledge your Name, grant graciously, through the intercession of Saints
Simon and Jude, that the Church may constantly grow by increase of the people
who believe in you.
