{"id":36105,"date":"2020-10-31T08:15:19","date_gmt":"2020-10-31T12:15:19","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/communio.stblogs.org\/?p=36105"},"modified":"2020-10-31T08:15:19","modified_gmt":"2020-10-31T12:15:19","slug":"st-alphonse-rodriguez","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/communio.stblogs.org\/index.php\/2020\/10\/st-alphonse-rodriguez\/","title":{"rendered":"St Alphonse Rodriguez"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"\"<\/a>Among many saints and blesseds liturgically honored today (e.g., Saint Wolfgang & Blessed Theodore Romzha), we have the feast of the Jesuit\u00a0Saint Alphonse Rodriguez, known for his extraordinary holiness that shone out of his ordinary work as the doorkeeper of a Jesuit school. Tremendous opportunities for holiness in the ordinary.<\/p>\n

Why is Rodriquez’s feast so important? Because in him I see how Grace expanded the horizon of a person’s humanity shining the love of the Savior. He met the high and low at the door as the Lord wanted: with love and dignity. Plus, many thought that a laybrother of the Society of Jesus and a man with a very humble assignment of doorkeeper could be a saint; he produced no summa, no great record of baptizing or being martyred in a far away land. By the way, the Capuchins have several saints who were doorkeepers and we also have the noteworthy Saint Andr\u00e9 Bessette, a Brother of Holy Cross. Many times, I believe, the laybrothers are supreme witnesses to Christ and the promise of salvation; religious brothers show the Hundredfold as realizable.<\/p>\n

What is memorable of Alphonse is a poem written by the Jesuit poet Gerard Manley Hopkins, number 49:<\/p>\n

HONOUR is flashed off exploit, so we say;
\nAnd those strokes once that gashed flesh or galled shield
\nShould tongue that time now, trumpet now that field,
\nAnd, on the fighter, forge his glorious day.
\nOn Christ they do and on the martyr may;
\nBut be the war within, the brand we wield
\nUnseen, the heroic breast not outward-steeled,
\nEarth hears no hurtle then from fiercest fray.<\/p>\n

Yet God (that hews mountain and continent,
\nEarth, all, out; who, with trickling increment,
\nVeins violets and tall trees makes more and more)
\nCould crowd career with conquest while there went
\nThose years and years by of world without event
\nThat in Majorca Alfonso watched the door.<\/p>\n

If you don’t know St. Alphonse, do yourself a favor and look up his biography.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Among many saints and blesseds liturgically honored today (e.g., Saint Wolfgang & Blessed Theodore Romzha), we have the feast of the Jesuit\u00a0Saint Alphonse Rodriguez, known for his extraordinary holiness that shone out of his ordinary work as the doorkeeper of a Jesuit school. Tremendous opportunities for holiness in the ordinary. Why is Rodriquez’s feast so … Continue reading St Alphonse Rodriguez<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[13],"tags":[32346,1734,1708],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/communio.stblogs.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/36105"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/communio.stblogs.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/communio.stblogs.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/communio.stblogs.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/communio.stblogs.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=36105"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/communio.stblogs.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/36105\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":36107,"href":"https:\/\/communio.stblogs.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/36105\/revisions\/36107"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/communio.stblogs.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=36105"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/communio.stblogs.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=36105"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/communio.stblogs.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=36105"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}