O Holy Father Nicholas, the fruit of your good deeds has enlightened and delighted the hearts of the faithful. Who cannot admire your measureless patience and humility? And who cannot wonder at your graciousness to the poor? At your compassion for the afflicted? O Bishop Nicholas, you have divinely taught all things well. And now wearing your unfading crown, you intercede for our souls with Christ, our God.
(Vesperal antiphon, Byzantine)
Loving God, whose service calls forthCourage in Your
servant’s soul,
We here gathered
sing the praise of
One who bravely
reached heav’n’s goal.
Claiming Christ
as only Savior,
Scorning those
with evil planned,
Now with
white-robed brilliance vested,
Near Your throne
she finds her stand.
How to love and
serve Your Name
That our hearts
may not be conquered
By our fears or
love of fame.
As she loved You
to her last breath,
Give us strength
to faithful be,
That our witness
may be fearless
And our lives
unfeigned and free.
Glory be to God,
the Son,
Glory be to God,
the Spirit:
Glory to the
Three-in-One!
From the virgin
choirs of heaven
And from tempted
saints below,
Endless hymns
and praise unceasing
Shall from all
our hearts e’er flow.
J. Michael Thompson, © copyright.
O God, source and origin of all fatherhood, who kept the
Martyrs Saint Andrew Dung-Lac and his companions faithful to the Cross of your
Son, even to the shedding of their blood, grant, through their intercession
that, spreading your love among our brothers and sisters, we may be your
children both in name and in truth.
Saint Andrew and his 117 companions are known as the Martyrs of Vietnam, killed for their faith in Christ between 1745 and 1862, but these people are few in number compared with the vast number of people thought to have been persecuted. Saint Andrew was a secular priest who was killed in 1839. Among the companions there were 8 bishops, 50 priests, 59 lay faithful of Vietnamese, Spanish and French nationalities. Pope John Paul II canonized these saints in 1988.
How blessed and wonderful, beloved, are the gifts of God. Life in immortality! Brightness in righteousness! Truth in full assurance! Faith in confidence! Temperance in holiness! And all this God has subjected to our understandings: What therefore will those things be which he has prepared for them that wait for him? Only the Creator and Father of spirits, the Most Holy, knows both the greatness and beauty of them. Let us therefore strive with all earnestness, that we may be found in the number of those that wait for him, and that we may receive the reward which he has promised. But how, beloved, shall we do this? We must fix our minds by faith towards God, and seek those things that are pleasing and acceptable to him. We must perform those things that are agreeable to his holy will and follow the way of truth, casting off from us all unrighteousness and iniquity, together with all covetousness, strife, evil manners, deceit, whispering, detractions, all hatred of God, pride and boasting, or vain-glory and ambition; For they that do these things are odious to God, and not only they that do them, but also all such as approve of
those that do them. (St Clement I to the Corinthians 17)
The encounter with the beautiful can become the wound
of the arrow that strikes the heart and in this way opens our eyes, so that
later, from this experience, we take the criteria for judgment and can
correctly evaluate the arguments. For me an unforgettable experience was the
Bach concert that Leonard Bernstein conducted in Munich after the sudden death
of Karl Richter. I was sitting next to the Lutheran Bishop Hanselmann. When the
last note of one of the great Thomas-Kantor-Cantatas triumphantly faded away,
we looked at each other spontaneously and right then we said: “Anyone who
has heard this, knows that the faith is true.” The music had such an
extraordinary force of reality that we realized, no longer by deduction, but by
the impact on our hearts, that it could not have originated from nothingness,
but could only have come to be through the power of the Truth that became real in
the composer’s inspiration. (Message to Communion and Liberation, August 2002,
Rimini, Italy; text available May 2, 2005, Zenit.org)
Saint Rose Philippine was called “the woman who is always praying.” Her singular focus on Christ and the mission won her esteem among those who found the Christian Gospel foreign. She is buried in St. Charles, MO, having died there on this date in 1852 at the age of 83. She lived the Lord’s parable of the Pearl of Great Price.
Beatified by Pope Pius XII in 1940 and canonized by Pope John Paul II in 1988, Duchesne is the US founder of the Society of the Sacred Heart, an order of religious women who were first founded in France by Saint Madeleine Sophie Barat.
The privilege of having the relics of one’s patron coming to your home is a singular experience. Friends who are seminarians at Saint Vladimir’s Orthodox Theological Seminary welcomed their patron’s relics in solemn ceremony this past weekend.
O Lord and Bridegroom of your Church,
We praise you for this virgin wise
Who, lighted lamp in hand, went forth
To preach her Groom and win his prize!
From early youth she heard your voice
And longed to work in Asian lands;
But “in the west you’ll find your east,”
The pope said, firm in his commands.
So from her home, Francesca came
That she might care for those who left
Italian homes to seek for work,
But in the New World were bereft.
She founded schools and hospitals
And orphan homes, and traveled wide;
Despite ill health and stature small
Her works became our Church’s pride.
She labored long with sisters brave,
And soon her congregation spread
From North to Southern hemisphere,
Although she sailed the seas with dread.
In labors long and hard, she worked
That Christ her Lord might be well served
In poor and sick and ignorant,
That they might feel God’s love deserved.
O Trinity of love most great,
O Father, Son, and Spirit blest,
With Frances and with all your saints
Bring us, at length, to heaven’s rest.
J. Michael Thompson
Copyright © 2009, World Library Publications
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