Et álibi aliórum plurimórum sanctórum Mártyrum et Confessórum, atque sanctárum Vírginum.
And elsewhere in divers places, many other holy martyrs, confessors, and holy virgins.
Пресвятая Богородице спаси нас!  (Santíssima Mãe de Deus, salva-nos!)
R.  Deo grátias. R.  Thanks be to God.
December is the month of the Immaculate Conception.
2022
22,810 lives saved since 2007

Octáva Conceptiónis Immaculátæ beátæ Maríæ Vírginis.
  The Octave of the Immaculate Conception of the Blessed Virgin Mary.
The Virgin Mary of Nazareth December 15

Our Bartholomew Family Prayer List
Joyful Mystery on Monday Saturday   Glorius Mystery on Sunday Wednesday
   Sorrowful Mystery on Friday Tuesday   Luminous Mystery on Thursday Veterens of War

Acts of the Apostles

Nine First Fridays Devotion to the Sacred Heart From the writings of St. Margaret Mary Alacoque
 How do I start the Five First Saturdays?
Mary Mother of GOD 15 Promises of the Virgin Mary to those who recite the Rosary

Please pray for those who have no one to pray for them.
December 15 – Our Lady of Lepanto (Italy) –
Melanie Calvat, La Salette visionary (d. 1904) – Mary Mediatrix
December 15
At Rome, the holy martyrs Irenaeus, Anthony, Theodore, Saturninus, Victor, and seventeen others who suffered for Christ in the persecution of Valerian. {Valerian overthrew the emperor and assumed power in 253. Four years later, he launched a persecution of Christians. Several high profile Christian leaders and several Roman bureaucrats fell in the purge. Pope Sixtus II and Bishop Cyprian of Carthage fell to the Roman axe. Saint Lawrence also perished in the pogrom.  
Gallienus ended the purge in 260. The empire ignored Christians for the next couple decades before Diocletian’s reign brought one of the worst persecutions in history.

December 15 – Our Lady of Lepanto (Italy) – Melanie Calvat, La Salette visionary (d. 1904) – Mary Mediatrix 

 On December 8, 1947, Venerable Marthe Robin made a prophetic statement 
 In France, on December 8, 1947, at Chateauneuf de Galaure in the Drôme department, Father Finet (Vernable Marthe’s spiritual father and cofounder with her of the Foyers of Charity)
entered her bedroom at 8:00 or 9:00 a.m. and said, "France is lost!"
Marthe replied, "No, Father, the Virgin Mary is going to appear and ask for children’s prayers."
That same day, at 1:00 p.m., the first apparition of the Virgin Mary took place at L’Ile Bouchard, to four children. Mary’s first words were: "Tell the children to pray for France—the need is great."
France was then on the brink of civil war.
The situation changed abruptly between the 8th and the 10th of December 1947.
The Mary of Nazareth Team

Pope Benedict XVI to The Catholic Church In China {whole article here }
The saints “a cloud of witnesses over our head”, showing us life of Christian perfection is possible.
The Virgin Mary of Nazareth December 15 - Our Lady of the Armed Forces (USA)
To transform the world, God chose a humble young girl from a village in Galilee, Mary of Nazareth, and challenged her with this greeting: "Hail, full of grace, the Lord is with you." In these words lies the secret of an authentic Christmas. God repeats them to the Church, to each one of us: Rejoice, the Lord is close!
With Mary's help, let us offer ourselves with humility and courage
so that the world may accept Christ, who is the source of true joy.
Angelus, December 17, 2006 Pope Benedict XVI
December 15 - Our Lady of the Armed Forces
Mary in the Midst of Israel's Waiting (VI)
"I shall be a father to him and he a son to me" (2 Sam 7:14)
The Blessed Virgin, just as all Israel, questioned the identity of the announced Messiah that God would send very quickly. Who actually would he be?

The people waited for a new presence of God among them, a new Temple, made not by human hands, but the prophecies announced in such a mysterious manner even more. They spoke of a priest who would be called "Lord", seated at the right hand of God: "Take your seat at my right hand, till I have made your enemies your footstool. The Lord will stretch out the scepter of your power; from Zion you will rule your foes all around you. Royal dignity has been yours from the day of your birth, sacred honor from the womb, from the dawn of your youth. The Lord has sworn an oath He will never retract; you are a priest forever of the order of Melchizedek" (Ps 110:1-5).

A true son of God: "I shall be a father to him and he a son to me" (2 Sam 7:14). "You are my son, today have I fathered you" (Ps 2:7). A man raised to the level of God: "I saw in the night visions, and, behold, there came with the clouds of the sky one like a son of man, and he came even to the ancient of days, and they brought him near before him" (Dan 7:9-14), or a very particular presence of God himself through other promises: we "shall call his name Immanuel (i.e. God with us)" (Is 7:14), and we dared to request in prayer: "Return for your servants' sake" (Is 63:17).
Vercéllis Ordinátio sancti Eusébii, Epíscopi et Mártyris.
    At Vercelli, the ordination of St. Eusebius, bishop and martyr.
 130 Hieromartyr Eleutherius his mother Evanthia and Caribus the Eparch  The Holy Martyr illustrious rich
        chamberlain in Byzantine court
Romæ sanctórum Mártyrum Irenæi, Antónii, Theodóri, Saturníni, Victóris, et aliórum decem et septem, qui, in persecutióne Valeriáni, pro Christo passi sunt.
    At Rome, the holy martyrs Irenaeus, Anthony, Theodore, Saturninus, Victor, and seventeen others who suffered for Christ in the persecution of Valerian. {Valerian overthrew the emperor and assumed power in 253. Four years later, he launched a persecution of Christians. Several high profile Christian leaders and several Roman bureaucrats fell in the purge. Pope Sixtus II and Bishop Cyprian of Carthage fell to the Roman axe. Saint Lawrence also perished in the pogrom.  Gallienus ended the purge in 260. The empire ignored Christians for the next couple decades before Diocletian’s reign brought one of the worst persecutions in history.
4th V.  St Nino, Virgin;  miracle worker of Georgia; helped conversion of Georgia in reign of Constatine; Uncertainty surrounds the beginnings of Christianity in the former kingdom of Georgia (Iberia), but the story of the beginning of its evangelization told by Rufinus is accepted—and improved on—by Georgians themselves and generally in the East.
 457 St. Valerian martyred Bishop of Abbenza (modern Africa)
 520 St. Maximinus First abbot of the Abbey of Micy
6th v. St Pardus the Hermit
7th v. St. Florentius Abbot of Bangor Monastery in Ireland
 750 Saint Stephen the Confessor Archbishop of Surrentium (Surozh) miracles at crypt
 760 St Stephen, Bishop of Surosh; exiled for defence of images, restored to his see on accession of Constantine V;  
 805 St. Urbitius Hermit, known in Spanish as Urbez
 955 Saint Paul of Latros clairvoyance and wonderworking Byzantine hermit 
       St. Nino Virgin the Apostle of Georgia  
1005 St. Adalbero Benedictine bishop
1500 Saint Nectarius of Bitel distinguished for his charity displayed complete humility
1583 Saint Tryphon of Pechenga and Kola devote life to apostolic deeds and to pagan Laplanders 
1590 Saint Jonah of Pechenga and Kola disciple of St Tryphon
1651 Saint Virginia Centurione Bracelli from Genoa, Italy. After husband's death she began charitable works, assisted the needy and sick. To help alleviate the poverty in her town, she founded the Cento Signore della Misericordia Protettrici dei Poveri di Gesù Cristo. The center was soon overrun with people suffering from the famine and plague of 1629-1630 and soon she had to rent the Monte Calvario convent to accommodate all the people.
1771 BD MARY MARGARET D’YoUvILLE (née Dufrost de Lajemmerais). Born at Varennes near Montreal, 1701; left a widow in 1722, she devoted herself to hospital work and in 1738 founded the Grey Nuns of Canada. She died on 23 December 1771 and was beatified in 1959.
1831 Bd VINCENT ROMANO. Born near Naples, 1751. He was the parish priest of Herculano (possibly the former Herculaneum, near Pompeii). He died in 1831 and was beatified in 1963.
1836 BD NuNzIo SuLPRIzIo. A layman, born 1817 in the Abruzzi province of Italy. He was a blacksmith by trade, who died in 1836 at the age of nineteen. He was beatified in 1963.

1855 St Mary Di Rosa, Virgin; acquired an unusual knowledge of theology; co- Foundress of The Handmaids of Charity of Brescia; anticipating Florence Nightingale by several years, the Handmaids of Charity ministered to the souls and bodies of the wounded on the battlefields. In the following year came the terrible “Ten Days of Brescia”. Paula and her sisters were at the disposal of all sufferers without distinction, but some disorderly troops made an attempt on the hospital. Paula, supported by half-a-dozen sisters, went to the front door to meet them: they carried a great crucifix, with a lighted candle on either side. The soldiers wavered, halted, and slunk away. And the crucifix (still preserved at Brescia) was carried from sick-bed to sick-bed that each occupant might give it a grateful kiss.
1876 Blessed Mary Frances Schervier; 1844 she became a Secular Franciscan; she and four companions established a religious community devoted to caring for the poor. In 1851 the Sisters of the Poor of St. Francis (a variant of the original name) were approved by the local bishop; the community soon spread. The first U.S. foundation was made in 1858; helped her sisters nurse soldiers wounded in the Civil War.
1900 BD LEONARD MURIALDO. A secular priest, born at Turin in 1828. He devoted his life to the welfare of young people and of manual workers, establishing the first “family house” in Italy for young working men. He founded the Society of St Joseph in Turin, where he died in 1900. He was beatified in 1963.
1929 Hilarion The holy New Martyr Archbishop outstanding theologian, an eloquent preacher, and a fearless defender of Christ's holy Church.
 130 Hieromartyr Eleutherius his mother Evanthia and Caribus the Eparch
Hieromartyr_Eleutherius.jpg
 1583 Saint Tryphon of Pechenga and Kola devote life to apostolic deeds and to pagan Laplanders
Saint_Tryphon_of_Kola.jpg
God loves variety. He doesn't mass-produce his saints. Every saint is unique, for each is the result of a new idea.As the liturgy says: Non est inventus similis illis--there are no two exactly alike. It is we with our lack of imagination, who paint the same haloes on all the saints. Dear Lord, grant us a spirit that is not bound by our own ideas and preferences. Grant that we may be able to appreciate in others what we lack in ourselves. O Lord, grant that we may understand that every saint must be a unique praise of Your glory.
Catholic saints are holy people and human people who lived extraordinary lives.  Each saint the Church honors responded to God's invitation to use his or her unique gifts. God calls each one of us to be a saint in order to get into heaven: 
The more "extravagant" graces are bestowed NOT for the benefit of the recipients so much as FOR the benefit of others.  The time for mercy  You have to… prepare the world for the Second Coming of Him who will come, not as a merciful Savior, but as a just judge. Oh, how terrible is that day. Fixed is the day of justice, the day of divine wrath. The angels tremble before it.  Speak to souls about this great mercy while it is still the time for mercy. (words of the Blessed Virgin Mary to St Faustina) Excerpt from Divine Mercy in My Soul: Diary of Sister M. Faustina Kowalska  (Stockbridge, Mass.: Marian Press 1987), p. 190, no. 429.


Vercéllis Ordinátio sancti Eusébii, Epíscopi et Mártyris.
At Vercelli, the ordination of St. Eusebius, bishop and martyr. 

130 Hieromartyr Eleutherius his mother Evanthia and Caribus the Eparch.
St Eleutherius, the son of an illustrious Roman citizen, was raised in Christian piety by his mother. His virtue was such that at the age twenty, he had been elevated to bishop of Illyria. In the reign of the emperor Hadrian, St Eleutherius was tortured for his bold preaching about Christ, then was beheaded at Rome with his mother Evanthia.
The Eparch Caribus, who had tortured St Eleutherius, also came to believe in Christ and was executed.
The Holy Martyr Eleutherius Cubicularius was an illustrious and rich chamberlain ["cubicularius"] at the Byzantine court. With all his courtly privileges, Eleutherius was not beguiled by worldly possessions and honors. Instead, he thought of imperishable and eternal things. Having accepted holy Baptism, he began daily to glorify God with psalmody and to adorn his life with virtuous deeds.

But one of his servants through diabolic promptings, informed against his master to the [then still pagan] emperor. The emperor tried to turn Eleutherius from his faith in Christ, but after the unsuccessful attempts the emperor gave orders to behead him, and to throw his body to be eaten by dogs and vultures. A certain Christian priest took up the saint's body and buried it.

There is a second commemoration of the martyr on August 4.
Romæ sanctórum Mártyrum Irenæi, Antónii, Theodóri, Saturníni, Victóris, et aliórum decem et septem, qui, in  persecutióne Valeriáni, pro Christo passi sunt.
    At Rome, the holy martyrs Irenaeus, Anthony, Theodore, Saturninus, Victor, and seventeen others who suffered for Christ in the persecution of Valerian.
In Africa, pássio sanctórum Faustíni, Lúcii, Cándidi, Cæliáni, Marci, Januárii et Fortunáti.
     In Africa, the martyrdom of Saints Faustinus, Lucius, Candidus, Cælian, Mark, Januarius, and Fortunatus.
4th V.  St Nino, Virgin;  miracle worker of Georgia; helped conversion of Georgia in reign of Constatine; Uncertainty surrounds the beginnings of Christianity in the former kingdom of Georgia (Iberia), but the story of the beginning of its evangelization told by Rufinus is accepted—and improved on—by the Georgians themselves and generally in the East.
Apud Ibéros, trans Pontum Euxínum, sanctæ Christiánæ ancíllæ, quæ miraculórum virtúte gentem illam, témpore Constantíni, ad Christi fidem perdúxit.
    Among the Iberians across the Euxine Sea, St. Christiana, a maidservant, who by virtue of her miracles led that people to the faith of Christ, in the time of Constantine.
   He tells us that early in the fourth century an unnamed maiden (whom the Georgians call Nino and the Roman Martyrology, not knowing her name, “Christiana”), carried off captive into the country, made a great impression on the people by the sobriety and chastity of her life and the long time, by day and night, that she gave to prayer. When questioned, she simply told them that she worshipped Christ as God.
   One day a mother brought her sick child to Nino, asking her how it ought to be treated. Nino told her that Jesus Christ was able to heal the most desperate cases and, wrapping the child in her rough mantle, called on the name of the Lord, and gave the baby back in perfect health to its mother. Rumours of this cure came to the queen of Iberia, who was herself ill, and she sent for Nino; when Nino declined to come, the queen had herself carried to her, and she also was cured. When she would thank and reward her benefactress she was told that, “It is not my work, but Christ’s; and He is the Son of God who made the world”. She reported these words to the king who, when he soon after got lost in a mist while hunting, swore that if this Christ was God and would show him his way home he would believe in Him. Instantly the mist cleared; and the king kept his word.
  He and his wife were instructed by St Nino, he announced his change of religion to the people, gave licence to the slave-girl to preach and teach, and began to build a church. In the course of its building God worked another miracle at the word of His servant, for a huge pillar, which neither men nor oxen had been able to move, turned itself on to its base and, after remaining suspended in the air, transported itself to its right place, before the eyes of a large crowd. The king sent an embassy to the Emperor Constantine, telling him what had happened and asking that bishops and priests might be sent to Iberia, which was duly done.
Rufinus learned this story from an Iberian prince, Bakur, whom he met in Palestine before the beginning of the fifth century, and it may well be believed that the conversion of Georgia was begun in the reign of Constantine and that a woman had a prominent part in it. The narrative of Rufinus has been translated—and amplified—into Greek, Syriac, Armenian, Coptic, Arabic and Ethiopic, while in Georgian literature there is a whole cycle of Nino legends, which are utterly worthless. Rufinus gives no localities for his events, or the name of the king and queen concerned, or even the name of the saint—much less her nationality or place of origin. Later versions supply these omissions several times over. Nino (sometimes said to have been not a captive slave but a voluntary fugitive from the persecution of Diocletian) came from Cappadocia—and also from Rome, Jerusalem and the Franks: the Armenians make her an Armenian and associate her with St Hripsime.
   After seeing Christianity firmly established in the land she is said to have retired to a cell on a mountain at Bodbe in Kakheti. Here she died and was buried; later the place was made an episcopal see and her tomb is still shown in the cathedral. It is also interesting to note that from time immemorial the cathedral of Mtzkheta has been known as the church of the Living Pillar. It is certain that Georgia was largely Christian at the time Rufinus wrote, but what was the truth behind the story he heard from the Georgian prince (and even what exactly that story itself was) it is now impossible to say.
The passage of Rufinus, regarding the provenance of which there has been much dis­cussion, may be best consulted in Mommsen’s text as published in the Berlin Academy’s edition of Eusebius. But the whole question has been greatly elucidated by Fr Paul Peeters in his article “Les Debuts du Christianisme en Géorgie” (Analecta Bollandiana, vol. 1, 1932, pp. 5—58). The elements, which have contributed to the development of the fantastic story of St Nino in its various forms, are too complicated to be discussed here. The legend does not appear in its best-known shape before 973, and the texts written in Georgian are still later in date. In the Oxford Studia Biblica et Ecelesiastica, vol. v, a life of St Nino has been translated into English from the Georgian by M. and J. Wardrop, and a somewhat cognate Armenian text is made accessible in the version of F. C. Conybeare, but the early dates there assigned to these documents are quite unwarranted. In German an essay by M. Kekelidze, Die Bekehrung Georgiens zum Christentum (1928) may be read with advantage. On the miraculous cross of St Nino see also Peeters in the Analecta Bollandiana, vol. liii (1935), pp. 305—306. In Egypt, St Nino was sometimes known as “Theognosta”, a name which seems to have arisen out of a misunderstanding of the Greek version or text of Rufinus, who does not give any name to the maiden apostle.
St. Nino Virgin the Apostle of Georgia
also listed as Christiana. According to custom, she was born in Cappadocia and became a slave. Taken to Iberia, she won the respect of many locals with her patience and goodness and by the miracles she supposedly performed. Brought to the royal palace, she converted the king and queen who then requested that the Roman Emperor Constantine the Great send missionaries and bishops. After helping to found the Church in Georgia, Nino retired to the life of a hermitess, spending the rest of her life in prayer. While there is no doubt about her historical existence or her work, Nino has been the subject of numerous tales and legends.
457 St. Valerian martyred Bishop of Abbenza (modern Africa)
Ibídem sancti Valeriáni Epíscopi, qui, cum esset annórum plus octogínta, in persecutióne Wandálica, sub Rege Ariáno Genseríco, convéntus ab eo ut tráderet Ecclésiæ utensília, idque constánter renuísset, extra civitátem singuláris jussus est pelli; cumque præcéptum esset ut nullus eum neque in domo neque in agro dimítteret habitáre, multo témpore in strata pública nudo sub áere jácuit, et, in confessióne et defensióne cathólicæ veritátis, cursum beátæ vitæ complévit.
    In the same country, the holy bishop Valerian, who, being upwards of eighty years of age, in the persecution of the Vandals, under the Arian king Genseric, was asked to deliver the vessels of the Church, and as he constantly refused, an order was issued to drive him all alone out of the city, and all persons were forbidden to allow him to stay in their houses or on their land.  For a long time he remained lying on the public road, in the open air, and thus in the confession and defence of Catholic truth he ended his blessed life.
He was a victim of the Arian Vandals who took the then eighty-year-old prelate out of his residence and left him to die of exposure in the streets after he refused to surrender his sacred vessels.
457 and 482 Ss. Valerian Other Martyrs In Africa
In addition to St Dionysia and those mentioned with her on the sixth, other victims of the Vandal persecutions are commemorated this month. Under King Genseric took place the martyrdom of the bishop St Valerian “who, when more than eighty years old, was told to give up the sacred vessels of his church. On his constant refusal so to do it was commanded that he be driven out of the city by himself and that no one be allowed to receive him in his house or on his land; wherefore he remained for a long time in the public street, uncared for, under the open sky, and in this confession and defence of Catholic truth he ended the course of his blessed life.”
On the morrow, likewise, is kept the feast of the many con­secrated virgins who suffered under Huneric. They were hung up by the arms and jerked up and down, branded with hot irons, sold into slavery, driven into the desert and in other ways harried and killed for Christ’s name’s sake.
We know nothing of these martyrs beyond what we learn from the Historia Wandalicae Persecutionis (bk 1, c. 39) by Victor of Vita. See also Quentin, Martyrologes historiques, p. 353.
520 St. Maximinus First abbot of the Abbey of Micy.
In territorio Aurelianénsi sancti Maximíni Confessóris.    In the territory of Orleans, St. Maximin, confessor.
also called Mesmin. King Clovis I founded Micy, near Orleans, France, placing Maximinus there as ruling abbot.
6th v. St Pardus the Hermit.
Roman, was involved in his youth with the teamster's craft. Once, when he traveled to Jericho, a boy accidentally fell under the legs of his camels. The camels trampled the boy to death. Shaken by this occurrence, Pardus became a monk and withdrew to Mount Arion.
Thinking himself as a murderer, and deserving of death, St Pardus entered the den of a lion. He poked the wild beast and prodded it with a spear so that the lion would tear him apart, but the creature would not touch the hermit. St Pardus then took off his clothes and lay down upon the path that the lion would take for water. But even here, the lion merely leaped over the hermit. And the Elder then understood that he had been forgiven by the Lord. Returning to his mountain, St Pardus dwelt there in fasting and prayer until the end of his days. He died in the sixth century.
750 Saint Stephen the Confessor Archbishop of Surrentium (Surozh) miracles at the saint's crypt
Native of Cappadocia and was educated at Constantinople. After receiving the monastic tonsure, he withdrew into the wilderness, where he lived for 30 years in ascetic deeds.

Patriarch Germanus of Constantinople (May 12) heard of Stephen's humility and virtuous life, and wished to meet him. He was so impressed with Stephen that he consecrated him bishop of the city of Surrentium (presently the city of Sudak in the Crimea). Within five years, St Stephen's ministry was so fruitful that no heretics or unbaptized pagans remained in Surrentium or its environs.

St Stephen opposed the iconoclasm of the emperor Leo III the Isaurian (716-741). Since he refused to obey the orders of the emperor and the dishonorable Patriarch Anastasius to remove the holy icons from the churches, he was brought to Constantinople. There he was thrown into prison and tortured. He was released after the death of the emperor. Already quite advanced in years, he returned to his flock in Surrentium, where he died.

There is an account of how the Russian prince Bravlin accepted Baptism at the beginning of the ninth century during a campaign into the Crimea, influenced by miracles at the saint's crypt.

760 St Stephen, Bishop of Surosh
According to his Greek vita this Stephen was a native of Cappadocia in Asia Minor, who became bishop of Surosh (now Sudak) in the Crimea on the coast of the Black Sea. During the Iconoclast persecution under the Emperor Leo III he was exiled for his defence of the veneration of images, but was restored to his see on the accession of Constantine V to the imperial throne in 740. In his later years St Stephen was outstanding for his preaching of the gospel among the neighbouring Slavs and Khazars and even, it is said, among the Varangians. The very late (fifteenth century) Russian version of his life narrates that a band of Varango-Russians marauding in the Crimea was dispersed by the sudden appear­ance of the bishop; the conversion of their leader, Yury, said to be from Novgorod, followed. The Russians keep the feast of St Stephen of Surosh, and there has been a revived interest in the saint among the learned in recent times together with St George of Amastris (February 21), because of their significance for the early history of the Varangians and of Christianity in Russia.
See Baumgarten, Aux origines de la Russie, cap. ii (1939); Taube, Rome et la Russie, t. i, passim (1947); Maltzev’s Menologium (1900). Father Martynov, in Annus Ecclesiasticus Graeco-Slavicus (Acta sanctorum, October, vol. xi), in his observanda on the calendar for December 15 gives a number of references of value to students. 
 760 St Stephen, Bishop of Surosh; exiled for defence of images, restored to his see on accession of Constantine V
According to his Greek vita this Stephen was a native of Cappadocia in Asia Minor, who became bishop of Surosh (now Sudak) in the Crimea on the coast of the Black Sea. During the Iconoclast persecution under the Emperor Leo III he was exiled for his defence of the veneration of images, but was restored to his see on the accession of Constantine V to the imperial throne in 740.
   In his later years St Stephen was outstanding for his preaching of the gospel among the neighbouring Slavs and Khazars and even, it is said, among the Varangians. The very late (fifteenth century) Russian version of his life narrates that a band of Varango-Russians marauding in the Crimea was dispersed by the sudden appear­ance of the bishop; the conversion of their leader, Yury, said to be from Novgorod, followed. The Russians keep the feast of St Stephen of Surosh, and there has been a revived interest in the saint among the learned in recent times together with St George of Amastris (February 21), because of their significance for the early history of the Varangians and of Christianity in Russia.

See Baumgarten, Aux origines de la Russie, cap. ii (1939); Taube, Rome et la Russie, t. i, passim (1947); Maltzev’s Menologium (1900). Father Martynov, in Annus Ecclesiasticus Graeco-Slavicus (Acta sanctorum, October, vol. xi), in his observanda on the calendar for December 15 gives a number of references of value to students.  
7th v. St. Florentius Abbot of Bangor Monastery in Ireland.
also called Flann. He was part of the great monastic program of evangelization and protection of the arts.
805 St. Urbitius Hermit, known in Spanish as Urbez.
Supposedly a native of Bordeaux, France, he entered a monastery but was captured by Saracen raiders and brought to Spain.
After escaping, he became a hermit in the Pyrenees Mountains near Huesca, Aragon, where he is still venerated.
955 Saint Paul of Latros clairvoyance and wonderworking.
a native of the city of Aelen in Pergamum. Early bereft of his father, he was educated at the monastery of St Stephen in Phrygia. After the death of his mother, he devoted himself completely to monastic deeds at a monastery on Mount Latra, near Miletos.

Seeking even loftier accomplishments, he secluded himself in a cave. For his ascetic deeds he gained the gifts of clairvoyance and wonderworking. The emperor Constantine VII Porphyrogenitos (912-959) often wrote to him, asking his prayers and counsel. St Paul twice withdrew to the island of Samos, where he established a monastery and restored three monasteries ravaged by the Hagarenes (Arabs). Foretelling his end, the monk reposed in the year 955.

956 St Paul of Latros
The father of this hermit was an officer in the imperial army who was slain in an engagement with the Saracens. His mother then retired from Pergamos, which was the place of his birth, to Bithynia, taking her two sons with her. Basil, the elder, took the monastic habit upon Mount Olympus in that country, but soon for the sake of greater solitude retired to Mount Latros (Latmus). When their mother was dead he induced his brother to embrace the same state of life. Though young, Paul had experienced the world sufficiently to understand the emptiness and dangers of what it has to offer.
Basil recommended him to the care and instruction of the abbot of Karia. St Paul desired for the sake of greater solitude and austerity to lead an eremitical life; but his abbot, thinking him too young, refused him leave so long as he lived. After his death Paul’s first cell was a cave on the highest part of Mount Latros, where for some weeks he had no other food than green acorns, which at first made him very sick. After eight months he was called back to Karia. It is said that when he worked in the kitchen the sight of the fire so forcibly reminded him of Hell that he burst into tears every time he looked at it.
When he was allowed to pursue his vocation Paul chose a new habitation on the rockiest part of the mountain, where for the first three years he suffered grievous temptations. A peasant sometimes brought him a little food, but he mostly lived on what grew wild. The reputation of his holiness spreading through the province, several men chose to live near him and built there a laura of cells. Paul, who had been careless about all corporal necessaries, was much concerned lest anything should be wanting to those that lived under his direction. After twelve years his solitude was so much broken into that he withdrew to another part of the mountains, whence he visited his brethren from time to time to cheer and encourage them; he sometimes took them into the forest to sing the Divine Office together in the open air. When asked why he appeared sometimes so joyful, at other times so sad, he answered,
“When nothing diverts my thoughts from God, my heart overflows with joy, so much that I often forget my food and every­thing else; and when there are distractions, I am upset”.
 Occasionally he disclosed something of the wonderful communications, which passed between his soul and God, and of the heavenly graces that he received in contemplation.
 But St Paul wished for yet closer retirement, so he passed over to the isle of Samos, and there concealed himself in a cave. But he was soon discovered and so many flocked to him that he re-established three lauras that had been ruined by the Saracens. The entreaties of the monks at Latros induced him to return to his former cell there. The Emperor Constantine Porphyrogenitus wrote frequently to him asking his advice, and often had reason to repent when he did not follow it. Paul had a great tenderness for the poor and he gave them more of his food and clothes than he could properly spare. Once he would have sold himself for a slave to help some people in distress had he not been stopped. On December 6 in 956, foreseeing that his death drew near, he came down from his cell to the church, celebrated the Holy Mysteries more early than usual and then took to his bed. He spent his time in prayer and instructing his monks till his death, which fell on December 15, on which day he is commemorated by the Greeks. He is sometimes referred to as St Paul the Younger.
After having been printed for the first time in the Analecta Bollandiana, vol. xi (1892), a still more carefully revised text was edited by Delehaye in the volume Der Latmos, issued in 1913 by T. Wiegand and other scholars, with abundant illustrations and archaeological comments. The Life of St Paul, written by an anonymous disciple, is one of the most trustworthy of Byzantine biographies. In Wiegand’s volume it is supplemented by a panegyric from MS. Vatican 704 previously unprinted. See also the Zeitschrift f. kath. Theologie, vol. xviii (1894), pp. 365 seq., and the Revue des quest. histor., vol. x (1893), pp. 49—85.
956 St. Paul of Latros  Byzantine hermit
sometimes listed as “the Younger.” Paul was born at Pergamos, near Smyrna, in Asia Minor, the son of an officer in the Byzantine army. His father was killed in battle, and after his mother died, he became a monk in a community on Mt. Olympus in Greece, with his brother, Basil. Paul later left the monastery and became a hermit on Mount Latros in Bithynia, Asia Minor. Soon he attracted followers, and Paul was compelled to organize them into a laura, or community. After twelve years, Paul departed Mount Latros and settled on the island of Samos to live in a cave. More followers gathered around him and Paul oversaw the creation of several more lauras before returning to Latros, where he died after years of prayer and mortifications. 
1005 St. Adalbero Benedictine bishop
Adalbero was a Benedictine who influenced his own era. He started his career as a monk in Gorze and was appointed the bishop of Verdun, France, in 984.
He was transferred to Metz the same year, where he founded Cluniac monasteries.
1500 Saint Nectarius of Bitel distinguished for his charity displayed complete humility.
born in the small town of Bitl (or Butili) in Bulgaria. In the world he was named Nicholas. Before a Turkish invasion he mother had a vision: the Most Holy Virgin Herself appeared and told her to flee and go into hiding with her husband and children. Nicholas's father, having taken the boy with him, withdrew to a monastery dedicated to the Holy Unmercenaries (Sts Cosmas and Damian), not far from Bitel, where he became a monk with the name Pachomius.

Nicholas, having reached adolescence, went on to Athos. The clairvoyant Elder Philotheus accepted him and tonsured him into the angelic schema with the name Nectarius. The monk suffered for a long time from the envy and spite of one of the novices, but he displayed complete humility. He was distinguished for his charity. Any money he obtained from his handicraft was distributed to the poor. St Nectarius died in the year 1500.
1583 Saint Tryphon of Pechenga and Kola devote life to apostolic deeds and to pagan Laplanders
in the world Metrophanes, was born in the Novgorod governia into a priestly family. The pious parents raised their son in the fear of God. From his early years Tryphon had resolved to devote his life to apostolic deeds and to go to the pagan Laplanders and proclaim the Gospel of Christ. He knew of them only through the accounts of fish vendors.

Once, while praying in the forest he had heard a voice, "Tryphon, this is not your place. An empty and thirsty land awaits you." Forsaking his parental home, the saint went out onto the Kola Peninsula and halted at the banks of the Pechenga River, where the Lapps lived. There he began to carry on trade with them. The saint first acquainted himself with the pagan beliefs of these people and studied their language, and then began to preach the Christian Faith to them. The Lapps greeted the words of the saint with great mistrust. The holy preacher suffered much hardship, enduring hostility and even beatings. But gradually, through his wise and kindly words and meekness, many were converted to Christ.

With the blessing of Archbishop Macarius of Novogord, St Tryphon and St Theodoretos built a church for the newly-converted. In 1532 he founded the Pechenga-Trinity monastery for those eager for the monastic life, "on the cold sea, on the frontier of Murmansk."

Tsar Ivan the Terrible helped him and richly endowed the monastery. The Enlightener of the Lapps died in old age in 1583, having lived at the Pechenga almost 60 years. Local veneration of St Tryphon began soon after his death.

In 1589, the Swedes destroyed the Pechenga monastery. Later, by order of Tsar Theodore, the monastery was transferred to the Kola Peninsula. On the site of the restored monastery a church was built and named for St Tryphon. Over the saint's grave a church was constructed in honor of the Meeting of the Lord. St Tryphon has often come to the aid of perishing seamen, who call upon his name with faith.
1590 Saint Jonah of Pechenga and Kola disciple of St Tryphon
tradition tells us, a priest in the city of Kola. After the death of his daughter and wife he went off to the Pechenga-Trinity monastery near Kola, and became a disciple of its founder, St Tryphon. After the death of his teacher, he settled in 1583 at the site of what was to become his grave in the neighboring Dormition wilderness, where he was killed by the Swedes in the year 1590.
1651 Saint Virginia Centurione Bracelli from Genoa, Italy. After husband's death she began charitable works, assisted the needy and sick. To help alleviate the poverty in her town, she founded the Cento Signore della Misericordia Protettrici dei Poveri di Gesù Cristo. The center was soon overrun with people suffering from the famine and plague of 1629-1630 and soon she had to rent the Monte Calvario convent to accommodate all the people.
Virginia was born on April 2, 1587, in Genoa, Italy to a noble family. She was the daughter of Giorgio Centurione, who was the Doge of Genoa from 1621-23 and to Lelia Spinola.  Despite her desire to live a cloistered life, she was forced into marriage to Gaspare Grimaldi Bracelli, a wealthy noble on December 10, 1602. She had two daughters: Lelia and Isabella. The marriage did not last long. She became a widow on June 13, 1607, at the age of 20. She refused another arranged marriage brought on by her father and took up a vow of chastity.  After her husband's death she began charitable works and assisted the needy and sick. To help alleviate the poverty in her town, she founded the Cento Signore della Misericordia Protettrici dei Poveri di Gesù Cristo. The center was soon overrun with people suffering from the famine and plague of 1629-1630 and soon she had to rent the Monte Calvario convent to accommodate all the people. By 1635 the center was caring for over 300 patients and received recognition as a hospital from the government. Due to declining funds given by the middle and upper classes, the Institute lost its government recognition in 1647.
She spent the remainder of her life acting as a peacemaker between noble houses and continuing her work for the poor. Virginia Bracelli died on December 15, 1651, at the age of 64.
Born April 2, 1587(1587-04-02), Genoa, Italy Died December 15, 1651 (aged 64), Genoa, Italy
Beatified September 22, 1985 by Pope John Paul II Canonized May 18, 2003 by Pope John Paul II

1771 BD MARY MARGARET D’YoUvILLE (née Dufrost de Lajemmerais). Born at Varennes near Montreal, 1701; left a widow in 1722, she devoted herself to hospital work and in 1738 founded the Grey Nuns of Canada. She died on 23 December 1771 and was beatified in 1959.
1831 Bd VINCENT ROMANO. Born near Naples, 1751. He was the parish priest of Herculano (possibly the former Herculaneum, near Pompeii). He died in 1831 and was beatified in 1963.
1836 BD NuNzIo SuLPRIzIo. A layman, born 1817 in the Abruzzi province of Italy. He was a blacksmith by trade, who died in 1836 at the age of nineteen. He was beatified in 1963.
1855 St Mary Di Rosa, Virginl acquired an unusual knowledge of theology; co- Foundress of The Handmaids of Charity of Brescia; anticipating Florence Nightingale by several years, the Handmaids of Charity ministered to the souls and bodies of the wounded on the battlefields. In the following year came the terrible “Ten Days of Brescia”. Paula and her sisters were at the disposal of all sufferers without distinction, but some disorderly troops made an attempt on the hospital. Paula, supported by half-a-dozen sisters, went to the front door to meet them: they carried a great crucifix, with a lighted candle on either side. The soldiers wavered, halted, and slunk away. And the crucifix (still preserved at Brescia) was carried from sick-bed to sick-bed that each occupant might give it a grateful kiss.
Three And a quarter centuries after Savonarola had foretold woe on the wickedness of the city of Brescia (prophecy that was fulfilled when the French seized and sacked the city in 1512), there was born there the third of the holy ones who, in the first half of the nineteenth century, were the contemporary glories of its citizens; the other two were Bd Ludovic Pavoni and Bd Teresa Verzeri.
   Mary di Rosa (called Paula or Pauline at home), born in 1813, was sixth of the nine children of Clement di Rosa, and his wife, Countess Camilla Albani. Her childhood was uneventful, but saddened by the death of her deeply loved mother when Paula was eleven. When she was seventeen Paula left school to look after the household for her father, and he began to look around for a suitable husband for her. When he had found one, Paula was rather startled, and took her difficulties to the archpriest of the cathedral, Mgr Faustino Pinzoni, a sagacious priest who had already dealt prudently with her spiritual problems. He decided himself to see Clement di Rosa, and explained gently to him that his daughter had decided that she would never marry. At a time when it was common, especially at the higher social levels, for fathers to pay little attention to the likes and dislikes of their children, notably in the matter of daughters’ marriages, it speaks well for Cay. Clement that he agreed to respect Paula’s resolution almost without demur, and throughout his life he seems to have supported her in what may have appeared to him as wild schemes.

During the next ten years Paula continued to live at home, but engaging herself more and more in social good works, in which she had the worthy example of her father before her eyes. Among his properties was a textile mill at Acquafredda where a number of girls worked, and one of Paula’s first undertakings was to look after the spiritual welfare of these young women; this solicitude she extended to those of Capriano, where the Rosas had a country house.

   Here, with co­operation of the parish priest, she established a women’s guild and arranged retreats and special missions in the parish, with such good results that the rector hardly knew his own flock.

Reference has already been made, in speaking of Bd Ludovic Pavoni and Bd Teresa Verzeri, to the cholera epidemics that devastated northern Italy at this time, and the outbreak at Brescia in 1836 gave Paula di Rosa another opportunity. She asked her father’s permission to work among the stricken in the hospital, and after some doubt and with considerable trepidation he agreed. The hospital welcomed Paula, who was accompanied by a widow, Gabriela Echenos-Bornati, who had already had some experience of nursing the sick, and they set an example of selfless hard work and gentle care that made a very deep impression on everybody. *{* Manzoni’s description in The Betrothed (I Promessi Sposi) of the isolation-hospital in Milan gives an idea of the conditions in which they worked.}
In consequence Paula was asked to undertake the supervision of an institution, which was a sort of workhouse for penniless and abandoned girls—a delicate and difficult post for a young woman of only twenty-four. She filled it successfully for two years, but then resigned in consequence of a difference with the trustees, who did not want the girls to lodge in the house at night. Paula herself then established a small lodging-house with room for a dozen girls to sleep, and at the same time gave her attention to a work that had been projected by her brother Philip and Mgr Pinzoni, namely, a school for deaf-and-dumb girls, on the lines of what Ludovic Pavoni was doing for boys. This school was still in its infancy when Paula handed it over to the Canossian sisters, who wished to do the same work in Brescia on a bigger scale.
All this was a really extraordinary ten-year record for a woman still under thirty and of delicate health and physique. But there was a certain virile quality in Paula di Rosa, and she had a physical energy and courage hardly to be expected—she once rescued somebody from a bolting horse and carriage in very dangerous circumstances. And her mind was to match, quick, acute and steady, so that, while living with heroic virtue, she was not content that intellectually and psycho­logically her religion should remain at the level of the “penny catechism”.
She acquired an unusual knowledge of theology, and brought to her reading the same liveliness of spirit and delicacy of perception that informed her dealings with practical affairs. Her mental ability was particularly noted when she became involved in the complexities inseparable from the establishment of a religious congregation, and she was further helped by a remarkably good memory for people and things, large and small. This congregation began to take shape in 1840, first in the form of a religious society of which the Archpriest Pinzoni appointed Paula superioress. With her was associated Mrs Bornati (who indeed may be called co-foundress), and the object of the society was to look after the sick in hospitals, not simply as nurses but as giving the whole of their time and interest unreservedly to the sick and suffering. They took the name of Handmaids of Charity, and the first four members took up their residence in an inconvenient and dilapidated house near the hospital. These were soon joined by fifteen Tirolese, who had heard about the undertaking from a visiting missioner, and before long the community numbered thirty-two. Their work aroused admiration that was publicly expressed in the press by a local doctor, who underlined the spiritual as well as the physical activities of the handmaids; but at the same time there was serious unfavourable criticism. Some people resented their presence as intruders, and tried to discredit them. This did not prevent an invitation, within three months of their foundation, to undertake similar work at Cremona, and this invitation was accepted. Of the difficulties at Brescia, “I hope that is not our last cross”, wrote Paula to the Cremona house, “because to tell the truth I should have been sorry had we not been persecuted”.
Before long Clement di Rosa, and their provisional rule of gave a new and more commodious house in Brescia to the handmaids life was approved by the bishop in 1843. But there was a counter-balance to these causes for rejoicing a few months later, when Gabriela Bornati died. Paula was thus deprived of her chief lieutenant, but she still had Mgr Pinzoni to advise and guide her, and the society continued to grow and to undertake the direction of new hospitals. But in the summer of 1848 death took the archpriest too, and that at a time when political upheaval was convulsing Europe and war had come to northern Italy.

Paula’s first response to new opportunities was to staff St Luke’s military hospital, where again the handmaids had to meet the opposition of doctors who preferred secular nurses and military orderlies. Civilian victims of war and prisoners were succoured and, anticipating Florence Nightingale by several years, the Handmaids of Charity ministered to the souls and bodies of the wounded on the battlefields. In the following year came the terrible “Ten Days of Brescia”. Paula and her sisters were at the disposal of all sufferers without distinction, but some disorderly troops made an attempt on the hospital. Paula, supported by half-a-dozen sisters, went to the front door to meet them: they carried a great crucifix, with a lighted candle on either side. The soldiers wavered, halted, and slunk away. And the crucifix (still preserved at Brescia) was carried from sick-bed to sick-bed that each occupant might give it a grateful kiss.
Paula aimed at a body of sisters who should combine spiritual with temporal care, lives of prayer and work, active but not “activist” or busybodies, “rushing about the streets with bowls of soup”, as St Louisa de Marillac put it. And there was wide scope for such organizations in Italy at that time. So in the autumn of 1850 she set out for Rome; on October 24 the pope, Pius IX; received her and two months later, with most remarkable speed for Rome, the constitutions of the congregation of Handmaids of Charity of Brescia were approved.
The approval of the civil power was less speedy, and it was not till the summer of 1852 that the first twenty-five sisters and their foun dress made their vows, and Paula took the name of Maria Crocifissa, “Mary of the Crucified”. The canonical erection of the congregation was the signal for its quick extension, but for Mother Mary the end was at hand, so far as this world was concerned. She was only forty-two, but she had taken every ounce out of her slight and delicate frame, and her recovery from illness on Good Friday 1855 looked miraculous. There was still work to be done—a threat of cholera at Brescia, convents to be opened at Spalato in Dalmatia and near Verona. Then at Mantua she collapsed, and reached home only to say, “Thank God He has let me get home to Brescia to die”. And  die she did, very peacefully and quietly, three weeks later, on December 15, 1855.
Mgr Pinzoni, who knew her so well, said of St Mary di Rosa that “her life is a marvel that astonishes everybody who sees it”; and the spirit of it all was confided to one of her sisters when she told her that “I can’t go to bed with a quiet conscience if during the day I’ve missed any chance, however slight, of preventing wrong-doing or of helping to bring about some good”. She would go out at a moment’s notice by day or night to look after somebody ill, to sit at the bedside of a dying sinner, to settle a quarrel, to comfort someone in distress. And the people of Brescia acknowledged this when they flocked to her funeral. She was canonized in 1954.
There is a full life in Italian by V. Bartoccetti, Beata Maria Crocifissa di Rosa (1940); a very adequate ninety-page summary, under the same title, by a member of the congregation; and another life by Dr L. Fossati. There seems to be nothing about her in any other language, perhaps because all the houses of the Handmaids of Brescia are in Italy or near by.
1876 Blessed Mary Frances Schervier; 1844 she became a Secular Franciscan; she and four companions established a religious community devoted to caring for the poor. In 1851 the Sisters of the Poor of St. Francis (a variant of the original name) were approved by the local bishop; the community soon spread. The first U.S. foundation was made in 1858; helped her sisters nurse soldiers wounded in the Civil War.
This woman who once wanted to become a Trappistine nun was instead led by God to establish a community of sisters who care for the sick and aged in the United States and throughout the world.
Born 1819 into a distinguished family in Aachen (then ruled by Prussia but formerly Aix-la-Chapelle, France), Frances ran the household after her mother’s death and established a reputation for generosity to the poor. In 1844 she became a Secular Franciscan. The next year she and four companions established a religious community devoted to caring for the poor. In 1851 the Sisters of the Poor of St. Francis (a variant of the original name) were approved by the local bishop; the community soon spread. The first U.S. foundation was made in 1858.

Mother Frances visited the United States in 1863 and helped her sisters nurse soldiers wounded in the Civil War. She visited the United States again in 1868. When Philip Hoever was establishing the Brothers of the Poor of St. Francis, she encouraged him.

When Mother Frances died, there were 2,500 members of her community worldwide. The number has kept growing. They are still engaged in operating hospitals and homes for the aged. Mother Mary Frances was beatified in 1974.
Comment: The sick, the poor and the aged are constantly in danger of being considered "useless" members of society and therefore ignored—or worse. Women and men motivated by the ideals of Mother Frances are needed if the God-given dignity and destiny of all people are to be respected.
Quote:  In 1868, Mother Frances wrote to all her sisters, reminding them of Jesus’ words: “You are my friends if you do what I command you.... I am giving you these commands so that you may love one another” (John 15:14,17).  She continued: “If we do this faithfully and zealously, we will experience the truth of the words of our father St. Francis who says that love lightens all difficulties and sweetens all bitterness. We will likewise partake of the blessing which St. Francis promised to all his children, both present and future, after having admonished them to love one another even as he had loved them and continues to love them.”
1900 BD LEONARD MURIALDO. A secular priest, born at Turin in 1828. He devoted his life to the welfare of young people and of manual workers, establishing the first “family house” in Italy for young working men. He founded the Society of St Joseph in Turin, where he died in 1900. He was beatified in 1963.
On 2 Holy Priests of the 19th Century "It Is Not Possible to Exercise Charity Without Living in Christ"
VATICAN CITY, APRIL 28, 2010 (Zenit.org).- Here is a translation of the address Benedict XVI gave today at the general audience in St. Peter's Square.

Dear Brothers and Sisters,
We are drawing close to the end of the Year for Priests and, on this last Wednesday of April, I would like to speak about two saintly priests who were exemplary in their giving of themselves to God and in their witness of charity -- lived in the Church and for the Church -- toward their neediest brothers: St. Leonard Murialdo and St. Joseph Benedict Cottolengo. Regarding the first, we mark the 110th anniversary of his death and the 40th of his canonization; regarding the second, the celebrations have begun for the second centenary of his priestly ordination.

Murialdo was born in Turin on Oct. 26, 1828: it was the Turin of St. John Bosco, of St. Joseph Cottolengo himself, a land fertilized by so many examples of holiness of the lay faithful and priests. Leonard was the eighth child of a simple family. As a child he entered, together with his brother, the school of the Escolapios Fathers of Savona for elementary, middle and high school; he found prepared educators, in a climate of religiosity founded on serious catecheses, with regular pious practices. During his adolescence, however, he went through a profound existential and spiritual crisis that led him to advance his return to his family and to conclude his studies in Turin, enrolling in the two-year period of philosophy.

A "return to the light" occurred -- as he recounts -- after a few months, with the grace of a general confession, in which he rediscovered God's immense mercy; at 17 the decision matured to become a priest, as a response of love to God who had seized him with his love. He was ordained on Sept. 20, 1851. Precisely in that period, as a catechist of the Guardian Angel Oratory, Don Bosco met and came to esteem him, convincing him to accept the direction of the new Oratory of St. Louis in Porta Nuova, which he did until 1865. There he also came into contact with the grave problems of the poorest classes, he visited their homes, developing a profound social, educational and apostolic sensitivity that led him later to dedicate himself independently to multiple initiatives in favor of youth. Catecheses, school and recreational activities were the foundation of his educational method in the Oratory. Don Bosco wanted him with him on the occasion of the audience granted by Blessed Pius IX in 1858.

In 1873 he founded the Congregation of St. Joseph, whose apostolic objective was, from the beginning, the formation of youth, especially the poorest and most abandoned. The environment of Turin at the time was marked by the intense flourishing of charitable works and activities promoted by Murialdo until his death, which occurred on March 30, 1900.
I wish to underline that the central nucleus of Murialdo's spirituality was the conviction of the merciful love of God: a Father who is always good, patient and generous, who reveals the greatness and immensity of his mercy with forgiveness. St. Leonard experienced this reality at the existential, not the intellectual level, through a living encounter with the Lord. He always considered himself a man graced by the merciful God: because of this he lived the joyous sense of gratitude to the Lord, the serene awareness of his own limitations, the ardent desire of penance, the constant and generous commitment to conversion. He saw all his existence not only illumined, guided, sustained by this love, but continually immersed in the infinite mercy of God. He wrote in his Spiritual Testament: "Your mercy surrounds me, O Lord ... How God is always and everywhere, so he is always and everywhere love, is always and everywhere mercy."

Recalling the moment of crisis he had in his youth, he wrote: "See how the good God wanted his goodness and generosity to shine again in an altogether singular way. Not only did he admit me again to his friendship, but he called me to a choice of predilection: he called me to the priesthood, and this only a few months after my return to him." Because of this, St. Leonard lived his priestly vocation as a free gift of the mercy of God with a sense of gratitude, joy and love. He wrote as well: "God has chosen me! He has called me, has in the end forced me to the honor, to the glory, to the ineffable happiness of being his minister, of being 'another Christ.' And where was I when God sought me? At the bottom of the abyss! I was there, and God came there to seek me; there he made me hear his voice."

Underlining the greatness of the mission of the priest who must "continue the work of redemption, the great work of Jesus Christ, the work of the Savior of the world," namely, that of "saving souls," St. Leonard always reminded himself and his confreres of the responsibility of a life consistent with the sacrament received. Love of God and love for God: this was the force of his journey of holiness, the law of his priesthood, the deepest meaning of this apostolate among poor young people and the source of his prayer. St. Leonard Murialdo abandoned himself with confidence to Providence, fulfilling generously the divine will, in contact with God and dedicating himself to poor young people. In this way he joined contemplative silence with the tireless ardor of action, fidelity to the duties of each day with the ingeniousness of initiatives, strength in difficulties with the serenity of the spirit. This was his way of holiness to live the commandment of love, towards God and towards his neighbor.

With the same spirit of charity, 40 years before Murialdo lived St. Joseph Benedict Cottolengo, founder of the work he himself called "Little Home of Divine Providence" and also called today "Cottolengo." Next Sunday, in my pastoral visit to Turin, I will be able to venerate the remains of this saint and meet the guests of the "Little Home."
1929 The holy New Martyr Archbishop Hilarion outstanding theologian, an eloquent preacher, and a fearless defender of Christ's holy Church
(Vladimir Alexeevich Troitsky in the world), an outstanding theologian, an eloquent preacher, and a fearless defender of Christ's holy Church, was born around 1885.

Vladika Hilarion wrote many books and articles on various topics, including "The Unity of the Church." His Master's thesis, "An Outline of the History of the Church's Dogma," was over five hundred pages long, and was a well-documented analysis of the subject.

During the Council of 1917 he delivered a brilliant address calling for the restoration of the Moscow Patriarchate, which had been dissolved byTsar Peter I in the eighteenth century. When St Tikhon (April 7) was chosen as Patriarch, St Hilarion became his fervent supporter.

St Hilarion was consecrated as bishop on May 20, 1920, and so the great luminary was placed upon the lampstand (Luke 11:33). From that time, he was to know less than two years of freedom. He spent only six months working with Patriarch Tikhon.

Vladika was arrested and exiled in Archangelsk for a year, then he spent six years (1923-1929) in a labor camp seven versts from Solovki. There at the Filomonov Whare he and at least two other bishops were employed in catching fish and mending nets. Paraphrasing the hymns of Pentecost, Archbishop Hilarion remarked, "Formerly, the fishermen became theologians. Now the theologians have become fishermen."

Archbishop Hilarion was one of the most popular inmates of the labor camp. He is remembered as tall, robust, and with brownish hair. Personal possessions meant nothing to him, so he always gave his things away to anyone who asked for them. He never showed annoyance when people disturbed him or insulted him, but remained cheerful.

In the summer of 1925, Vladika was taken from the camp and placed in the Yaroslav prison. There he was treated more leniently, and received certain privileges. For example, he was allowed to receive religious books, and he had pleasant conversations with the warden in his office. St Hilarion regarded his time at the Yaroslav Isolated Detention Center as the best part of his imprisonment. The following spring he was back at Solovki.

In 1929 the Communists decided to exile Archbishop Hilarion to Alma-Atu in central Asia. During his trip southward from the far north, St Hilarion was robbed and endured many privations. When he arrived in Petrograd, he was ill with typhus, infested with parasites and dressed in rags. When informed that he would have to be shaved, he replied, "You may now do with me whatever you wish." He wrote from the prison hospital, "My fate will be decided on Saturday, December 15. I doubt I will survive."

St Hilarion died at the age of forty-four in the hospital of a Petrograd prison on December 15, 1929. His body was placed in a coffin hastily made from some boards, and then was released to his family. The once tall and robust Archbishop Hilarion had been transformed by his sufferings into a pitiful white-haired old man. One female relative fainted when she saw the body.

Metropolitan Seraphim (Chichagov) provided a set of white vestments for the late Archbishop. He was also placed in a better coffin.
Metropolitan Seraphim presided at the funeral of St Hilarion, assisted by six bishops and several priests. The saint was buried at Novo-Divichy Monastery.


THE PSALTER OF THE BLESSED VIRGIN MARY PSALM 217

Be not angry with the wicked, O Lady: sweeten their fury by thy grace.

O ye religious and cloistered souls, hope in her: confide in her, ye priests and seculars.

Take delight in her praises: and she will grant the petitions of your heart.

Better is a little with her grace: than treasures of silver and precious stones.

Glory be to thee forever, O Queen of Heaven: and never forget us at any time.

 For thy spirit is kind: thy grace fills the whole world.

Thunder, ye heavens, from above, and give praise to her: glorify her, ye earth, with all the dwellers therein.

 Rejoice, ye Heavens, and be glad, O Earth: because Mary will console her servants and will have mercy on her poor.

Glory be to the Father, and to the Son and to the Holy Ghost as it was in the beginning and will always be.
God loves variety. He doesn't mass-produce his saints. Every saint is unique, for each is the result of a new idea. 
As the liturgy says: Non est inventus similis illis--there are no two exactly alike. It is we with our lack of imagination, who paint the same haloes on all the saints. Dear Lord, grant us a spirit that is not bound by our own ideas and preferences. 
Grant that we may be able to appreciate in others what we lack in ourselves. O Lord, grant that we may understand that every saint must be a unique praise of Your glory. Catholic saints are holy people and human people who lived extraordinary lives.  Each saint the Church honors responded to God's invitation to use his or her unique gifts.   God calls each one of us to be a saint in order to get into heaven:  only saints are allowed into heaven.
The more "extravagant" graces are bestowed NOT for the benefit of the recipients so much as FOR the benefit of others.
There are over 10,000 named saints beati  from history
 and Roman Martyology Orthodox sources
Patron_Saints.html  Widowed_Saints html  Indulgences The Catholic Church in China
LINKS: Marian Shrines   India Marian Shrine Lourdes of the East   Lourdes 1858  China Marian shrines 1995
Kenya national Marian shrine  Loreto, Italy  Marian Apparitions (over 2000)  Quang Tri Vietnam La Vang 1798
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The great psalm of the Passion, Chapter 22, whose first verse “My God, my God, why hast thou forsaken me?”
Jesus pronounced on the cross, ended with the vision: “All the ends of the earth shall remember and turn to the Lord;
and all the families of the nations shall worship before him” For kingship belongs to the LORD, the ruler over the nations. All who sleep in the earth will bow low before God; All who have gone down into the dust will kneel in homage. And I will live for the LORD; my descendants will serve you. The generation to come will be told of the Lord, that they may proclaim to a people yet unborn the deliverance you have brought.
Pope Benedict XVI to The Catholic Church In China {whole article here} 2000 years of the Catholic Church in China
The saints “a cloud of witnesses over our head”, showing us life of Christian perfection is possible.

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Saint Frances Xavier Seelos  Practical Guide to Holiness
1. Go to Mass with deepest devotion. 2. Spend a half hour to reflect upon your main failing & make resolutions to avoid it.
3. Do daily spiritual reading for at least 15 minutes, if a half hour is not possible.  4. Say the rosary every day.
5. Also daily, if at all possible, visit the Blessed Sacrament; toward evening, meditate on the Passion of Christ for a half hour, 6.  Conclude the day with evening prayer & an examination of conscience over all the faults & sins of the day.
7.  Every month make a review of the month in confession.
8. Choose a special patron every month & imitate that patron in some special virtue.
9. Precede every great feast with a novena that is nine days of devotion. 10. Try to begin & end every activity with a Hail Mary
My God, I believe, I adore, I trust and I love Thee.  I beg pardon for those who do not believe, do not adore, do not
O most Holy trinity, Father, Son and Holy Spirit, I adore Thee profoundly.  I offer Thee the most precious Body, Blood, Soul and Divinity of Jesus Christ, present in all the Tabernacles of the world, in reparation for the outrages, sacrileges and indifference by which He is offended, and by the infite merits of the Sacred Heart of Jesus and the Immaculate Heart of Mary.  I beg the conversion of poor sinners,  Fatima Prayer, Angel of Peace
The voice of the Father is heard, the Son enters the water, and the Holy Spirit appears in the form of a dove.
THE spirit and example of the world imperceptibly instil the error into the minds of many that there is a kind of middle way of going to Heaven; and so, because the world does not live up to the gospel, they bring the gospel down to the level of the world. It is not by this example that we are to measure the Christian rule, but words and life of Christ. All His followers are commanded to labour to become perfect even as our heavenly Father is perfect, and to bear His image in our hearts that we may be His children. We are obliged by the gospel to die to ourselves by fighting self-love in our hearts, by the mastery of our passions, by taking on the spirit of our Lord.
   These are the conditions under which Christ makes His promises and numbers us among His children, as is manifest from His words which the apostles have left us in their inspired writings. Here is no distinction made or foreseen between the apostles or clergy or religious and secular persons. The former, indeed, take upon themselves certain stricter obligations, as a means of accomplishing these ends more perfectly; but the law of holiness and of disengagement of the heart from the world is general and binds all the followers of Christ.
God loves variety. He doesn't mass-produce his saints. Every saint is unique each the result of a new idea.
As the liturgy says: Non est inventus similis illis--there are no two exactly alike.
It is we with our lack of imagination, who paint the same haloes on all the saints.
Dear Lord, grant us a spirit not bound by our own ideas and preferences.
 Grant that we may be able to appreciate in others what we lack in ourselves.
O Lord, grant that we may understand that every saint must be a unique praise of Your glory.
 Catholic saints are holy people and human people who lived extraordinary lives.
Each saint the Church honors responded to God's invitation to use his or her unique gifts.
The 15 Promises of the Virgin Mary to those who recite the Rosary ) Revealed to St. Dominic and Blessed Alan)
1.    Whoever shall faithfully serve me by the recitation of the Rosary, shall receive signal graces. 2.    I promise my special protection and the greatest graces to all those who shall recite the Rosary. 3.    The Rosary shall be a powerful armor against hell, it will destroy vice, decrease sin, and defeat heresies. 4.    It will cause virtue and good works to flourish; it will obtain for souls the abundant mercy of God; it will withdraw the hearts of people from the love of the world and its vanities, and will lift them to the desire of eternal things.  Oh, that soul would sanctify them by this means.  5.    The soul that recommends itself to me by the recitation of the Rosary shall not perish. 6.    Whoever shall recite the Rosary devoutly, applying themselves to the consideration of its Sacred Mysteries shall never be conquered by misfortune.  God will not chastise them in His justice, they shall not perish by an unprovided death; if they be just, they shall remain in the grace of God, and become worthy of eternal life. 7.    Whoever shall have a true devotion for the Rosary shall not die without the Sacraments of the Church. 8.    Those who are faithful to recite the Rosary shall have during their life and at their death the light of God and the plentitude of His graces; at the moment of death they shall participate in the merits of the Saints in Paradise. 9.    I shall deliver from purgatory those who have been devoted to the Rosary. 10.    The faithful children of the Rosary shall merit a high degree of glory in Heaven.  11.    You shall obtain all you ask of me by the recitation of the Rosary. 12.    I shall aid all those who propagate the Holy Rosary in their necessities. 13.    I have obtained from my Divine Son that all the advocates of the Rosary shall have for intercessors the entire celestial court during their life and at the hour of death. 14.    All who recite the Rosary are my children, and brothers and sisters of my only Son, Jesus Christ. 15.    Devotion to my Rosary is a great sign of predestination.
His Holiness Aram I, current (2013) Catholicos of Cilicia of Armenians, whose See is located in Lebanese town of Antelias. The Catholicosate was founded in Sis, capital of Cilicia, in the year 1441 following the move of the Catholicosate of All Armenians back to its original See of Etchmiadzin in Armenia. The Catholicosate of Cilicia enjoyed local jurisdiction, though spiritually subject to the authority of Etchmiadzin. In 1921 the See was transferred to Aleppo in Syria, and in 1930 to Antelias.
Its jurisdiction currently extends to Syria, Cyprus, Iran and Greece.
Aramaic dialect of Edessa, now known as Syriac
The exact date of the introduction of Christianity into Edessa {Armenian Ourhaï in Arabic Er Roha, commonly Orfa or Urfa, its present name} is not known. It is certain, however, that the Christian community was at first made up from the Jewish population of the city. According to an ancient legend, King Abgar V, Ushana, was converted by Addai, who was one of the seventy-two disciples. In fact, however, the first King of Edessa to embrace the Christian Faith was Abgar IX (c. 206) becoming official kingdom religion.
Christian council held at Edessa early as 197 (Eusebius, Hist. Ecc7V,xxiii).
In 201 the city was devastated by a great flood, and the Christian church was destroyed (“Chronicon Edessenum”, ad. an. 201).
In 232 the relics of the Apostle St. Thomas were brought from India, on which occasion his Syriac Acts were written.

Under Roman domination martyrs suffered at Edessa: Sts. Scharbîl and Barsamya, under Decius; Sts. Gûrja, Schâmôna, Habib, and others under Diocletian. 
In the meanwhile Christian priests from Edessa evangelized Eastern Mesopotamia and Persia, established the first Churches in the kingdom of the Sassanides.  Atillâtiâ, Bishop of Edessa, assisted at the Council of Nicæa (325). The “Peregrinatio Silviæ” (or Etheriæ) (ed. Gamurrini, Rome, 1887, 62 sqq.) gives an account of the many sanctuaries at Edessa about 388.
Although Hebrew had been the language of the ancient Israelite kingdom, after their return from Exile the Jews turned more and more to Aramaic, using it for parts of the books of Ezra and Daniel in the Bible. By the time of Jesus, Aramaic was the main language of Palestine, and quite a number of texts from the Dead Sea Scrolls are also written in Aramaic.
Aramaic continued to be an important language for Jews, alongside Hebrew, and parts of the Talmud are written in it.
After Arab conquests of the seventh century, Arabic quickly replaced Aramaic as the main language of those who converted to Islam, although in out of the way places, Aramaic continued as a vernacular language of Muslims.
Aramaic, however, enjoyed its greatest success in Christianity. Although the New Testament wins written in Greek, Christianity had come into existence in an Aramaic-speaking milieu, and it was the Aramaic dialect of Edessa, now known as Syriac, that became the literary language of a large number of Christians living in the eastern provinces of the Roman Empire and in the Persian Empire, further east. Over the course of the centuries the influence of the Syriac Churches spread eastwards to China (in Xian, in western China, a Chinese-Syriac inscription dated 781 is still to be seen); to southern India where the state of Kerala can boast more Christians of Syriac liturgical tradition than anywhere else in the world.

680 Shiite saint Imam Hussein, grandson of Islam's Prophet Muhammad Known as Ashoura and observed by Shiites across the world, the 10th day of the lunar Muslim month of Muharram: the anniversary of the 7th century death in battle of one of Shiite Islam's most beloved saints.  Imam Hussein died in the 680 A.D. battle fought on the plains outside Karbala, a city in modern Iraq that's home to the saint's shrine.  The battle over a dispute about the leadership of the Muslim faith following Muhammad's death in 632 A.D. It is the defining event in Islam's split into Sunni and Shiite branches.  The occasion is the source of an enduring moral lesson. "He sacrificed his blood to teach us not to give in to corruption, coercion, or use of force and to seek honor and justice."  According to Shiite beliefs, Hussein and companions were denied water by enemies who controlled the nearby Euphrates.  Streets get partially covered with blood from slaughter of hundreds of cows and sheep. Volunteers cook the meat and feed it to the poor.  Hussein's martyrdom recounted through a rich body of prose, poetry and song remains an inspirational example of sacrifice to many Shiites, 10 percent of the world's estimated 1.3 billion Muslims.
Meeting of the Saints  walis (saints of Allah)
Great men covet to embrace martyrdom for a cause and principle.
So was the case with Hazrat Ali. He could have made a compromise with the evil forces of his time and, as a result, could have led a very comfortable, easy and luxurious life.  But he was not a person who would succumb to such temptations. His upbringing, his education and his training in the lap of the holy Prophet made him refuse such an offer.
Rabia Al-Basri (717–801 C.E.) She was first to set forth the doctrine of mystical love and who is widely considered to be the most important of the early Sufi poets. An elderly Shia pointed out that during his pre-Partition childhood it was quite common to find pictures and portraits of Shia icons in Imambaras across the country.
Shah Abdul Latif: The Exalted Sufi Master born 1690 in a Syed family; died 1754. In ancient times, Sindh housed the exemplary Indus Valley Civilisation with Moenjo Daro as its capital, and now, it is the land of a culture which evolved from the teachings of eminent Sufi saints. Pakistan is home to the mortal remains of many Sufi saints, the exalted among them being Shah Abdul Latif Bhittai, a practitioner of the real Islam, philosopher, poet, musicologist and preacher. He presented his teaching through poetry and music - both instruments sublime - and commands a very large following, not only among Muslims but also among Hindus and Christians. Sindh culture: The Shah is synonymous with Sindh. He is the very fountainhead of Sindh's culture. His message remains as fresh as that of any present day poet, and the people of Sindh find solace from his writings. He did indeed think for Sindh. One of his prayers, in exquisite Sindhi, translates thus: “Oh God, may ever You on Sindh bestow abundance rare! Beloved! All the world let share Thy grace, and fruitful be.”
Shia Ali al-Hadi, died 868 and son Hassan al-Askari 874. These saints are the 10th and 11th of Shia's 12 most revered Imams. Baba Farid Sufi 1398 miracle, Qutbuddin Bakhtiar Kaki renowned Muslim Sufi saint scholar miracles 569 A.H. [1173 C.E.] hermit gave to poor, Khwaja Moinuddin Chishti greatest mystic of his time born 533 Hijri (1138-39 A.D.), Hazrat Ghuas-e Azam, Hazrat Bu Ali Sharif, and Hazrat Nizamuddin Aulia Sufi Saint Hazrath Khwaja Syed Mohammed Badshah Quadri Chisty Yamani Quadeer (RA) 1236-1325 welcomed people of all faiths & all walks of life.
801 Rabi'a al-'Adawiyya Sufi One of the most famous Islamic mystics
(b. 717). This 8th century saint was an early Sufi who had a profound influence on later Sufis, who in turn deeply influenced the European mystical love and troubadour traditions.  Rabi'a was a woman of Basra, a seaport in southern Iraq.  She was born around 717 and died in 801 (185-186).  Her biographer, the great medieval poet Attar, tells us that she was "on fire with love and longing" and that men accepted her "as a second spotless Mary" (186).  She was, he continues, “an unquestioned authority to her contemporaries" (218).
Rabi'a began her ascetic life in a small desert cell near Basra, where she lost herself in prayer and went straight to God for teaching.  As far as is known, she never studied under any master or spiritual director.  She was one of the first of the Sufis to teach that Love alone was the guide on the mystic path (222).  A later Sufi taught that there were two classes of "true believers": one class sought a master as an intermediary between them and God -- unless they could see the footsteps of the Prophet on the path before them, they would not accept the path as valid.  The second class “...did not look before them for the footprint of any of God's creatures, for they had removed all thought of what He had created from their hearts, and concerned themselves solely with God. (218)
Rabi'a was of this second kind.  She felt no reverence even for the House of God in Mecca:  "It is the Lord of the house Whom I need; what have I to do with the house?" (219) One lovely spring morning a friend asked her to come outside to see the works of God.  She replied, "Come you inside that you may behold their Maker.  Contemplation of the Maker has turned me aside from what He has made" (219).  During an illness, a friend asked this woman if she desired anything.
"...[H]ow can you ask me such a question as 'What do I desire?'  I swear by the glory of God that for twelve years I have desired fresh dates, and you know that in Basra dates are plentiful, and I have not yet tasted them.  I am a servant (of God), and what has a servant to do with desire?" (162)
When a male friend once suggested she should pray for relief from a debilitating illness, she said,
"O Sufyan, do you not know Who it is that wills this suffering for me?  Is it not God Who wills it?  When you know this, why do you bid me ask for what is contrary to His will?  It is not  well to oppose one's Beloved." (221)
She was an ascetic.  It was her custom to pray all night, sleep briefly just before dawn, and then rise again just as dawn "tinged the sky with gold" (187).  She lived in celibacy and poverty, having renounced the world.  A friend visited her in old age and found that all she owned were a reed mat, screen, a pottery jug, and a bed of felt which doubled as her prayer-rug (186), for where she prayed all night, she also slept briefly in the pre-dawn chill.  Once her friends offered to get her a servant; she replied,
"I should be ashamed to ask for the things of this world from Him to Whom the world belongs, and how should I ask for them from those to whom it does not belong?"  (186-7)
A wealthy merchant once wanted to give her a purse of gold.  She refused it, saying that God, who sustains even those who dishonor Him, would surely sustain her, "whose soul is overflowing with love" for Him.  And she added an ethical concern as well:
"...How should I take the wealth of someone of whom I do not know whether he acquired it lawfully or not?" (187)
She taught that repentance was a gift from God because no one could repent unless God had already accepted him and given him this gift of repentance.  She taught that sinners must fear the punishment they deserved for their sins, but she also offered such sinners far more hope of Paradise than most other ascetics did.  For herself, she held to a higher ideal, worshipping God neither from fear of Hell nor from hope of Paradise, for she saw such self-interest as unworthy of God's servants; emotions like fear and hope were like veils -- i.e., hindrances to the vision of God Himself.  The story is told that once a number of Sufis saw her hurrying on her way with water in one hand and a burning torch in the other.  When they asked her to explain, she said:
"I am going to light a fire in Paradise and to pour water on to Hell, so that both veils may vanish altogether from before the pilgrims and their purpose may be sure..." (187-188)
She was once asked where she came from.  "From that other world," she said.  "And where are you going?" she was asked.  "To that other world," she replied (219).  She taught that the spirit originated with God in "that other world" and had to return to Him in the end.  Yet if the soul were sufficiently purified, even on earth, it could look upon God unveiled in all His glory and unite with him in love.  In this quest, logic and reason were powerless.  Instead, she speaks of the "eye" of her heart which alone could apprehend Him and His mysteries (220).
Above all, she was a lover, a bhakti, like one of Krishna’s Goptis in the Hindu tradition.  Her hours of prayer were not so much devoted to intercession as to communion with her Beloved.  Through this communion, she could discover His will for her.  Many of her prayers have come down to us:
       "I have made Thee the Companion of my heart,
        But my body is available for those who seek its company,
        And my body is friendly towards its guests,
        But the Beloved of my heart is the Guest of my soul."  [224]
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Mother Angelica saving souls is this beautiful womans journey  Shrine_of_The_Most_Blessed_Sacrament
Colombia was among the countries Mother Angelica visited. 
In Bogotá, a Salesian priest - Father Juan Pablo Rodriguez - brought Mother and the nuns to the Sanctuary of the Divine Infant Jesus to attend Mass.  After Mass, Father Juan Pablo took them into a small Shrine which housed the miraculous statue of the Child Jesus. Mother Angelica stood praying at the side of the statue when suddenly the miraculous image came alive and turned towards her.  Then the Child Jesus spoke with the voice of a young boy:  “Build Me a Temple and I will help those who help you.” 

Thus began a great adventure that would eventually result in the Shrine of the Most Blessed Sacrament, a Temple dedicated to the Divine Child Jesus, a place of refuge for all. Use this link to read a remarkable story about The Shrine of the Most Blessed Sacrament
Father Reardon, Editor of The Catholic Bulletin for 14 years Lover of the poor; “A very Holy Man of God.”
Monsignor Reardon Protonotarius Apostolicus
  Pastor 42 years BASILICA OF SAINT MARY Minneapolis MN
America's First Basilica Largest Nave in the World
August 7, 1907-ground broke for the foundation
by Archbishop Ireland-laying cornerstone May 31, 1908
James M. Reardon Publication History of Basilica of Saint Mary 1600-1932
James M. Reardon Publication  History of the Basilica of Saint Mary 1955 {update}

Brief History of our Beloved Holy Priest Here and his published books of Catholic History in North America
Reardon, J.M. Archbishop Ireland; Prelate, Patriot, Publicist, 1838-1918.
A Memoir (St. Paul; 1919); George Anthony Belcourt Pioneer Catholic Missionary of the Northwest 1803-1874 (1955);
The Catholic Church IN THE DIOCESE OF ST. PAUL from earliest origin to centennial achievement 1362-1950 (1952);
The Church of Saint Mary of Saint Paul 1875-1922;  (1932)
The Vikings in the American Heartland;
The Catholic Total Abstinence Society in Minnesota;
James Michael Reardon Born in Nova Scotia, 1872;  Priest, ordained by Bishop Ireland;
Member -- St. Paul Seminary faculty.
Affiliations and Indulgences  Litany of Loretto in Stained glass windows here.  Nave Sacristy and Residence Here
Sanctuary spaces between them filled with grilles of hand-forged wrought iron the life of our Blessed Lady After the crucifixon
Apostle statues Replicas of those in St John Lateran--Christendom's earliest Basilica.
Ordered by Rome's first Christian Emperor, Constantine the Great, Popes' cathedral and official residence first millennium of Christian history.
The only replicas ever made:  in order from west to east {1932}.
Every Christian must be a living book wherein one can read the teaching of the gospel
 It Makes No Sense Not To Believe In GOD
THE BLESSED MOTHER AND ISLAM By Father John Corapi. 
  June 19, Trinity Sunday, 1991: Ordained Catholic Priest under Pope John Paul II;
then 2,000,000 miles delivering the Gospel to millions, and continues to do so.
By Father John Corapi
THE BLESSED MOTHER AND ISLAM By Father John Corapi. 
  June 19, Trinity Sunday, 1991: Ordained Catholic Priest under Pope John Paul II;
then 2,000,000 miles delivering the Gospel to millions, and continues to do so.
By Father John Corapi
Among the most important titles we have in the Catholic Church for the Blessed Virgin Mary are Our Lady of Victory and Our Lady of the Rosary. These titles can be traced back to one of the most decisive times in the history of the world and Christendom. The Battle of Lepanto took place on October 7 (date of feast of Our Lady of Rosary), 1571. This proved to be the most crucial battle for the Christian forces against the radical Muslim navy of Turkey. Pope Pius V led a procession around St. Peter’s Square in Vatican City praying the Rosary. He showed true pastoral leadership in recognizing the danger posed to Christendom by the radical Muslim forces, and in using the means necessary to defeat it. Spiritual battles require spiritual weapons, and this more than anything was a battle that had its origins in the spiritual order—a true battle between good and evil.

Today we have a similar spiritual battle in progress—a battle between the forces of good and evil, light and darkness, truth and lies, life and death. If we do not soon stop the genocide of abortion in the United States, we shall run the course of all those that prove by their actions that they are enemies of God—total collapse, economic, social, and national. The moral demise of a nation results in the ultimate demise of a nation. God is not a disinterested spectator to the affairs of man. Life begins at conception. This is an unalterable formal teaching of the Catholic Church. If you do not accept this you are a heretic in plain English. A single abortion is homicide. The more than 48,000,000 abortions since Roe v. Wade in the United States constitute genocide by definition. The group singled out for death—unwanted, unborn children.

No other issue, not all other issues taken together, can constitute a proportionate reason for voting for candidates that intend to preserve and defend this holocaust of innocent human life that is abortion.
As we watch the spectacle of the world seeming to self-destruct before our eyes, we can’t help but be saddened and even frightened by so much evil run rampant. Iraq, Lebanon, Afghanistan, Somalia, North Korea—It is all a disaster of epic proportions displayed in living color on our television screens.  These are not ordinary times and this is not business as usual. We are at a crossroads in human history and the time for Catholics and all Christians to act is now. All evil can ultimately be traced to its origin, which is moral evil. All of the political action, peace talks, international peacekeeping forces, etc. will avail nothing if the underlying sickness is not addressed. This is sin. One person at a time hearts and minds must be moved from evil to good, from lies to truth, from violence to peace.
Islam, an Arabic word that has often been defined as “to make peace,” seems like a living contradiction today. Islam is a religion of peace.  As we celebrate the birthday of Our Lady, I am proposing that each one of us pray the Rosary for peace. Prayer is what must precede all other activity if that activity is to have any chance of success. Pray for peace, pray the Rosary every day without fail.  There is a great love for Mary among Muslim people. It is not a coincidence that a little village named Fatima is where God chose to have His Mother appear in the twentieth century. Our Lady’s name appears no less than thirty times in the Koran. No other woman’s name is mentioned, not even that of Mohammed’s daughter, Fatima. In the Koran Our Lady is described as “Virgin, ever Virgin.”

Archbishop Fulton Sheen prophetically spoke of the resurgence of Islam in our day. He said it would be through the Blessed Virgin Mary that Islam would be converted. We must pray for this to happen quickly if we are to avert a horrible time of suffering for this poor, sinful world. Turn to our Mother in this time of great peril. Pray the Rosary every day. Then, and only then will there be peace, when the hearts and minds of men are changed from the inside.
Talk is weak. Prayer is strong. Pray!  God bless you, Father John Corapi

Father Corapi's Biography

Father John Corapi is what has commonly been called a late vocation. In other words, he came to the priesthood other than a young man. He was 44 years old when he was ordained. From small town boy to the Vietnam era US Army, from successful businessman in Las Vegas and Hollywood to drug addicted and homeless, to religious life and ordination to the priesthood by Pope John Paul II, to a life as a preacher of the Gospel who has reached millions with the simple message that God's Name is Mercy!

Father Corapi's academic credentials are quite extensive. He received a Bachelor of Business Administration degree from Pace University in the seventies. Then as an older man returned to the university classrooms in preparation for his life as a priest and preacher. He received all of his academic credentials for the Church with honors: a Masters degree in Sacred Scripture from Holy Apostles Seminary and Bachelor, Licentiate, and Doctorate degrees in dogmatic theology from the University of Navarre in Spain.
Father John Corapi goes to the heart of the contemporary world's many woes and wars, whether the wars in Afghanistan, Iraq, Lebanon, Somalia, or the Congo, or the natural disasters that seem to be increasing every year, the moral and spiritual war is at the basis of everything. “Our battle is not against human forces,” St. Paul asserts, “but against principalities and powers, against the world rulers of this present darkness...” (Ephesians 6:12). 
The “War to end all wars” is the moral and spiritual combat that rages in the hearts and minds of human beings. The outcome of that  unseen fight largely determines how the battle in the realm of the seen unfolds.  The title talk, “With the Moon Under Her Feet,” is taken from the twelfth chapter of the Book of Revelation, and deals with the current threat to the world from radical Islam, and the Blessed Virgin Mary's role in the ultimate victory that will result in the conversion of Islam. Few Catholics are aware of the connection between Islam, Fatima, and Guadalupe. Presented in Father Corapi's straight-forward style, you will be both inspired and educated by him.

About Father John Corapi.
Father Corapi is a Catholic priest .
The pillars of father's preaching are basically:
Love for and a relationship with the Blessed Virgin Mary 
Leading a vibrant and loving relationship with Jesus Christ
Great love and reverence for the Most Holy Eucharist from Holy Mass to adoration of the Blessed Sacrament
An uncompromising love for and obedience to the Holy Father and the teaching of the Magisterium of the Church

God Bless you on your journey Father John Corapi


Records on life of Father Flanagan, founder of Boys Town, presented at Vatican
Jul 23, 2019 - 03:01 am .- The cause for canonization of Servant of God Edward Flanagan, the priest who founded Nebraska's Boys Town community for orphans and other boys, advanced Monday with the presentation of a summary of records on his life.

Archbishop Fulton Sheen to be beatified
Jul 6, 2019 - 04:00 am .- Pope Francis approved the miracle attributed to Archbishop Fulton Sheen Friday, making possible the American television catechist's beatification.

Brooklyn diocese advances sainthood cause of local priest
Jun 25, 2019 - 03:01 am .- The Bishop of Brooklyn accepted last week the findings of a nine-year diocesan investigation into the life of Monsignor Bernard John Quinn, known for fighting bigotry and serving the African American population, as part of his cause for canonization.

Fr. Augustus Tolton, former African American slave, advances toward sainthood
Jun 12, 2019 - 05:03 am .- Fr. Augustus Tolton advanced along the path to sainthood Wednesday, making the runaway slave-turned-priest one step closer to being the first black American saint.

Pope Francis will beatify these martyred Greek-Catholic bishops in Romania
May 30, 2019 - 03:01 pm .- On Sunday in Blaj, Pope Francis will beatify seven Greek-Catholic bishops of Romania who were killed by the communist regime between 1950 and 1970.
 
Woman who served Brazil’s poorest to be canonized
May 14, 2019 - 06:53 am .- Pope Francis Tuesday gave his approval for eight sainthood causes to proceed, including that of Bl. Dulce Lopes Pontes, a 20th-century religious sister who served Brazil’s poor.

Seven 20th-century Romanian bishops declared martyrs
Mar 19, 2019 - 12:01 pm .- Pope Francis declared Tuesday the martyrdom of seven Greek-Catholic bishops killed by the communist regime in Romania in the mid-20th century.

Pope advances sainthood causes of 17 women
Jan 15, 2019 - 11:12 am .- Pope Francis approved Tuesday the next step in the canonization causes of 17 women from four countries, including the martyrdom of 14 religious sisters killed in Spain at the start of the Spanish Civil War.
 
Nineteen Algerian martyrs beatified
Dec 10, 2018 - 03:08 pm .- Bishop Pierre Claverie and his 18 companions, who were martyred in Algeria between 1994 and 1996, were beatified Saturday during a Mass in Oran.

The Algerian martyrs shed their blood for Christ, pope says
Dec 7, 2018 - 10:02 am .- Ahead of the beatification Saturday of Bishop Pierre Claverie and his 18 companions, who were martyred in Algeria between 1994 and 1996, Pope Francis said martyrs have a special place in the Church.
Algerian martyrs are models for the Church, archbishop says
Nov 16, 2018 - 03:01 am .- Archbishop Paul Desfarges of Algiers has said that Bishop Pierre Claverie and his 18 companions, who were martyred in Algeria between 1994 and 1996, are “models for our lives as disciples today and tomorrow.”
 
Francesco Spinelli to be canonized after healing of a newborn in DR Congo
Oct 9, 2018 - 05:01 pm .- Among those being canonized on Sunday are Fr. Franceso Spinelli, a diocesan priest through whose intercession a newborn was saved from death in the Democratic Republic of the Congo.

Algerian martyrs to be beatified in December
Sep 14, 2018 - 06:01 pm .- The Algerian bishops' conference has announced that the beatification of Bishop Pierre Claverie and his 18 companions, who were martyred in the country between 1994 and 1996, will be held Dec. 8.

Now a cardinal, Giovanni Angelo Becciu heads to congregation for saints' causes
Jun 28, 2018 - 11:41 am .- Newly-minted Cardinal Giovanni Angelo Becciu will resign from his post as substitute of the Secretariat of State tomorrow, in anticipation of his appointment as prefect of the Congregation for the Causes of Saints later this summer.

Pope Francis creates new path to beatification under ‘offering of life’
Jul 11, 2017 - 06:22 am .- On Tuesday Pope Francis declared a new category of Christian life suitable for consideration of beatification called “offering of life” – in which a person has died prematurely through an offering of their life for love of God and neighbor.
 
Twentieth century Polish nurse among causes advancing toward sainthood
Jul 7, 2017 - 06:14 am .- Pope Francis on Friday approved a miracle attributed to the intercession of the Venerable Hanna Chrzanowska, a Polish nurse and nursing instructor who died from cancer in 1973, paving the way for her beatification.
 
Sainthood causes advance, including layman who resisted fascism
Jun 17, 2017 - 09:22 am .- Pope Francis on Friday recognized the heroic virtue of six persons on the path to canonization, as well as the martyrdom of an Italian man who died from injuries of a beating he received while imprisoned in a concentration camp for resisting fascism.
 
Solanus Casey, Cardinal Van Thuan among those advanced toward sainthood
May 4, 2017 - 10:47 am .- Pope Francis on Thursday approved decrees of the Congregation for the Causes of Saints advancing the causes for canonization of 12 individuals, including the American-born Capuchin Solanus Casey and the Vietnamese cardinal Francis Xavier Nguen Van Thuan.
 
Pope clears way for canonization of Fatima visionaries
Mar 23, 2017 - 06:44 am .- On Thursday Pope Francis approved the second and final miracle needed to canonize Blessed Francisco and Jacinta Marto, two of the shepherd children who witnessed the Fatima Marian apparitions.
Surgeon and father among sainthood causes moving forward
Feb 27, 2017 - 11:03 am .- Pope Francis recognized on Monday the heroic virtue of eight persons on the path to canonization, including an Italian surgeon and father of eight who suffered from several painful diseases throughout his life.

Records on life of Father Flanagan, founder of Boys Town, presented at Vatican
Jul 23, 2019 - 03:01 am .- The cause for canonization of Servant of God Edward Flanagan, the priest who founded Nebraska's Boys Town community for orphans and other boys, advanced Monday with the presentation of a summary of records on his life.

Archbishop Fulton Sheen to be beatified
Jul 6, 2019 - 04:00 am .- Pope Francis approved the miracle attributed to Archbishop Fulton Sheen Friday, making possible the American television catechist's beatification.

Brooklyn diocese advances sainthood cause of local priest
Jun 25, 2019 - 03:01 am .- The Bishop of Brooklyn accepted last week the findings of a nine-year diocesan investigation into the life of Monsignor Bernard John Quinn, known for fighting bigotry and serving the African American population, as part of his cause for canonization.

Fr. Augustus Tolton, former African American slave, advances toward sainthood
Jun 12, 2019 - 05:03 am .- Fr. Augustus Tolton advanced along the path to sainthood Wednesday, making the runaway slave-turned-priest one step closer to being the first black American saint.

Pope Francis will beatify these martyred Greek-Catholic bishops in Romania
May 30, 2019 - 03:01 pm .- On Sunday in Blaj, Pope Francis will beatify seven Greek-Catholic bishops of Romania who were killed by the communist regime between 1950 and 1970.
 
Woman who served Brazil’s poorest to be canonized
May 14, 2019 - 06:53 am .- Pope Francis Tuesday gave his approval for eight sainthood causes to proceed, including that of Bl. Dulce Lopes Pontes, a 20th-century religious sister who served Brazil’s poor.

Seven 20th-century Romanian bishops declared martyrs
Mar 19, 2019 - 12:01 pm .- Pope Francis declared Tuesday the martyrdom of seven Greek-Catholic bishops killed by the communist regime in Romania in the mid-20th century.

Pope advances sainthood causes of 17 women
Jan 15, 2019 - 11:12 am .- Pope Francis approved Tuesday the next step in the canonization causes of 17 women from four countries, including the martyrdom of 14 religious sisters killed in Spain at the start of the Spanish Civil War.
 
Nineteen Algerian martyrs beatified
Dec 10, 2018 - 03:08 pm .- Bishop Pierre Claverie and his 18 companions, who were martyred in Algeria between 1994 and 1996, were beatified Saturday during a Mass in Oran.

The Algerian martyrs shed their blood for Christ, pope says
Dec 7, 2018 - 10:02 am .- Ahead of the beatification Saturday of Bishop Pierre Claverie and his 18 companions, who were martyred in Algeria between 1994 and 1996, Pope Francis said martyrs have a special place in the Church.
Algerian martyrs are models for the Church, archbishop says
Nov 16, 2018 - 03:01 am .- Archbishop Paul Desfarges of Algiers has said that Bishop Pierre Claverie and his 18 companions, who were martyred in Algeria between 1994 and 1996, are “models for our lives as disciples today and tomorrow.”
 
Francesco Spinelli to be canonized after healing of a newborn in DR Congo
Oct 9, 2018 - 05:01 pm .- Among those being canonized on Sunday are Fr. Franceso Spinelli, a diocesan priest through whose intercession a newborn was saved from death in the Democratic Republic of the Congo.

Algerian martyrs to be beatified in December
Sep 14, 2018 - 06:01 pm .- The Algerian bishops' conference has announced that the beatification of Bishop Pierre Claverie and his 18 companions, who were martyred in the country between 1994 and 1996, will be held Dec. 8.

Now a cardinal, Giovanni Angelo Becciu heads to congregation for saints' causes
Jun 28, 2018 - 11:41 am .- Newly-minted Cardinal Giovanni Angelo Becciu will resign from his post as substitute of the Secretariat of State tomorrow, in anticipation of his appointment as prefect of the Congregation for the Causes of Saints later this summer.

Pope Francis creates new path to beatification under ‘offering of life’
Jul 11, 2017 - 06:22 am .- On Tuesday Pope Francis declared a new category of Christian life suitable for consideration of beatification called “offering of life” – in which a person has died prematurely through an offering of their life for love of God and neighbor.
 
Twentieth century Polish nurse among causes advancing toward sainthood
Jul 7, 2017 - 06:14 am .- Pope Francis on Friday approved a miracle attributed to the intercession of the Venerable Hanna Chrzanowska, a Polish nurse and nursing instructor who died from cancer in 1973, paving the way for her beatification.
 
Sainthood causes advance, including layman who resisted fascism
Jun 17, 2017 - 09:22 am .- Pope Francis on Friday recognized the heroic virtue of six persons on the path to canonization, as well as the martyrdom of an Italian man who died from injuries of a beating he received while imprisoned in a concentration camp for resisting fascism.
 
Solanus Casey, Cardinal Van Thuan among those advanced toward sainthood
May 4, 2017 - 10:47 am .- Pope Francis on Thursday approved decrees of the Congregation for the Causes of Saints advancing the causes for canonization of 12 individuals, including the American-born Capuchin Solanus Casey and the Vietnamese cardinal Francis Xavier Nguen Van Thuan.
 
Pope clears way for canonization of Fatima visionaries
Mar 23, 2017 - 06:44 am .- On Thursday Pope Francis approved the second and final miracle needed to canonize Blessed Francisco and Jacinta Marto, two of the shepherd children who witnessed the Fatima Marian apparitions.
Surgeon and father among sainthood causes moving forward
Feb 27, 2017 - 11:03 am .- Pope Francis recognized on Monday the heroic virtue of eight persons on the path to canonization, including an Italian surgeon and father of eight who suffered from several painful diseases throughout his life.
8 Martyrs Move Closer to Sainthood 8 July, 2016
Posted by ZENIT Staff on 8 July, 2016

The angel appears to Saint Monica
This morning, Pope Francis received Prefect of the Congregation for the Causes of Saints, Cardinal Angelo Amato. During the audience, he authorized the promulgation of decrees concerning the following causes:

***
MIRACLES:
Miracle attributed to the intercession of the Venerable Servant of God Luis Antonio Rosa Ormières, priest and founder of the Congregation of the Sisters of the Holy Guardian Angel; born July 4, 1809 and died on Jan. 16, 1890
MARTYRDOM:
Servants of God Antonio Arribas Hortigüela and 6 Companions, Missionaries of the Sacred Heart; killed in hatred of the Faith, Sept. 29, 1936
Servant of God Josef Mayr-Nusser, a layman; killed in hatred of the Faith, Feb. 24, 1945
HEROIC VIRTUE:

Servant of God Alfonse Gallegos of the Order of Augustinian Recollects, Titular Bishop of Sasabe, auxiliary of Sacramento; born Feb. 20, 1931 and died Oct. 6, 1991
Servant of God Rafael Sánchez García, diocesan priest; born June 14, 1911 and died on Aug. 8, 1973
Servant of God Andrés García Acosta, professed layman of the Order of Friars Minor; born Jan. 10, 1800 and died Jan. 14, 1853
Servant of God Joseph Marchetti, professed priest of the Congregation of the Missionaries of St. Charles; born Oct. 3, 1869 and died Dec. 14, 1896
Servant of God Giacomo Viale, professed priest of the Order of Friars Minor, pastor of Bordighera; born Feb. 28, 1830 and died April 16, 1912
Servant of God Maria Pia of the Cross (née Maddalena Notari), foundress of the Congregation of Crucified Sisters Adorers of the Eucharist; born Dec. 2, 1847 and died on July 1, 1919
Sunday, November 23 2014 Six to Be Canonized on Feast of Christ the King.

On the List Are Lay Founder of a Hospital and Eastern Catholic Religious
VATICAN CITY, June 12, 2014 (Zenit.org) - Today, the Vatican announced that during the celebration of the feast of Christ the King on Sunday, November 23, an ordinary public consistory will be held for the canonization of the following six blesseds, who include a lay founder of a hospital for the poor, founders of religious orders, and two members of the Syro-Malabar Catholic Church, an Eastern Catholic Church in full communion with the Holy See:
-Giovanni Antonio Farina (1803-1888), an Italian bishop who founded the Institute of the Sisters Teachers of Saint Dorothy, Daughters of the Sacred Hearts
-Kuriakose Elias Chavara (1805-1871), a Syro-Malabar priest in India who founded the Carmelites of Mary Immaculate
-Ludovico of Casoria (1814-1885), an Italian Franciscan priest who founded the Gray Sisters of St. Elizabeth
-Nicola Saggio (Nicola da Longobardi, 1650-1709), an Italian oblate of the Order of Minims
-Euphrasia Eluvathingal (1877-1952), an Indian Carmelite of the Syro-Malabar Church
-Amato Ronconi (1238-1304), an Italian, Third Order Franciscan who founded a hospital for poor pilgrims
CAUSES OF SAINTS July 2015.
Pope Recognizes Heroic Virtues of Ukrainian Archbishop
Recognition Brings Metropolitan Archbishop Andrey Sheptytsky Closer to Beatification
By Junno Arocho Esteves Rome, July 17, 2015 (ZENIT.org)
Pope Francis recognized the heroic virtues of Ukrainian Greek Catholic Archbishop Andrey Sheptytsky. According to a communique released by the Holy See Press Office, the Holy Father met this morning with Cardinal Angelo Amato, Prefect of the Congregation for the Causes of Saints.

The Pope also recognized the heroic virtues of several religious/lay men and women from Italy, Spain, France & Mexico.
Metropolitan Andrey Sheptytsky is considered to be one of the most influential 20th century figures in the history of the Ukrainian Church.
Enthroned as Metropolitan of Lviv in 1901, Archbishop Sheptytsky was arrested shortly after the outbreak of World War I in 1914 by the Russians. After his imprisonment in several prisons in Russia and the Ukraine, the Archbishop was released in 1918.

The Ukrainian Greek Catholic prelate was also an ardent supporter of the Jewish community in Ukraine, going so far as to learn Hebrew to better communicate with them. He also was a vocal protestor against atrocities committed by the Nazis, evidenced in his pastoral letter, "Thou Shalt Not Kill." He was also known to harbor thousands of Jews in his residence and in Greek Catholic monasteries.
Following his death in 1944, his cause for canonization was opened in 1958.
* * *
The Holy Father authorized the Congregation to promulgate the following decrees regarding the heroic virtues of:
- Servant of God Andrey Sheptytsky, O.S.B.M., major archbishop of Leopolis of the Ukrainians, metropolitan of Halyc (1865-1944);
- Servant of God Giuseppe Carraro, Bishop of Verona, Italy (1899-1980);
- Servant of God Agustin Ramirez Barba, Mexican diocesan priest and founder of the Servants of the Lord of Mercy (1881-1967);
- Servant of God Simpliciano della Nativita (ne Aniello Francesco Saverio Maresca), Italian professed priest of the Order of Friars Minor, founder of the Franciscan Sisters of the Sacred Hearts (1827-1898);
- Servant of God Maria del Refugio Aguilar y Torres del Cancino, Mexican founder of the Mercedarian Sisters of the Blessed Sacrament (1866-1937);
- Servant of God Marie-Charlotte Dupouy Bordes (Marie-Teresa), French professed religious of the Society of the Religious of the Sacred Hearts of Jesus and Mary (1873-1953);
- Servant of God Elisa Miceli, Italian founder of the Rural Catechist Sisters of the Sacred Heart (1904-1976);
- Servant of God Isabel Mendez Herrero (Isabel of Mary Immaculate), Spanish professed nun of the Servants of St. Joseph (1924-1953)
October 01, 2015 Vatican City, Pope Authorizes following Decrees
(ZENIT.org) By Staff Reporter
Polish Layperson Recognized as Servant of God
Pope Authorizes Decrees
Pope Francis on Wednesday authorised the Congregation for Saints' Causes to promulgate the following decrees:

MARTYRDOM
- Servant of God Valentin Palencia Marquina, Spanish diocesan priest, killed in hatred of the faith in Suances, Spain in 1937;

HEROIC VIRTUES
- Servant of God Giovanni Folci, Italian diocesan priest and founder of the Opera Divin Prigioniero (1890-1963);
- Servant of God Franciszek Blachnicki, Polish diocesan priest (1921-1987);
- Servant of God Jose Rivera Ramirez, Spanish diocesan priest (1925-1991);
- Servant of God Juan Manuel Martín del Campo, Mexican diocesan priest (1917-1996);
- Servant of God Antonio Filomeno Maria Losito, Italian professed priest of the Congregation of the Most Holy Redeemer (1838-1917);
- Servant of God Maria Benedetta Giuseppa Frey (nee Ersilia Penelope), Italian professed nun of the Cistercian Order (1836-1913);
- Servant of God Hanna Chrzanowska, Polish layperson, Oblate of the Ursulines of St. Benedict (1902-1973).
March 06 2016 MIRACLES authorised the Congregation to promulgate the following decrees:
Pope Francis received in a private audience Cardinal Angelo Amato, prefect of the Congregation for the Causes of Saints, during which he authorised the Congregation to promulgate the following decrees:
MIRACLES

– Blessed Manuel González García, bishop of Palencia, Spain, founder of the Eucharistic Missionaries of Nazareth (1877-1940);
– Blessed Elisabeth of the Trinity (née Elisabeth Catez), French professed religious of the Order of Discalced Carmelites (1880-1906);
– Venerable Servant of God Marie-Eugène of the Child Jesus (né Henri Grialou), French professed priest of the Order of Discalced Carmelites, founder of the Secular Institute “Notre-Dame de Vie” (1894-1967);
– Venerable Servant of God María Antonia of St. Joseph (née María Antonio de Paz y Figueroa), Argentine founder of the Beaterio of the Spiritual Exercise of Buenos Aires (1730-1799);
HEROIC VIRTUE

– Servant of God Stefano Ferrando, Italian professed priest of the Salesians, bishop of Shillong, India, founder of the Congregation of Missionary Sisters of Mary Help of Christians (1895-1978);
– Servant of God Enrico Battista Stanislao Verjus, Italian professed priest of the Missionaries of the Sacred Heart of Jesus, coadjutor of the apostolic vicariate of New Guinea (1860-1892);
– Servant of God Giovanni Battista Quilici, Italian diocesan priest, founder of the Congregation of the Daughters of the Crucified (1791-1844);
– Servant of God Bernardo Mattio, Italian diocesan priest (1845-1914);
– Servant of God Quirico Pignalberi, Italian professed priest of the Order of Friars Minor Conventual (1891-1982);
– Servant of God Teodora Campostrini, Italian founder of the Minim Sisters of Charity of Our Lady of Sorrows (1788-1860);
– Servant of God Bianca Piccolomini Clementini, Italian founder of the Company of St. Angela Merici di Siena (1875-1959);
– Servant of God María Nieves of the Holy Family (née María Nieves Sánchez y Fernández), Spanish professed religious of the Daughters of Mary of the Pious Schools (1900-1978).

April 26 2016 MIRACLES authorised the Congregation to promulgate the following decrees:
Here is the full list of decrees approved by the Pope:

MIRACLES
– Blessed Alfonso Maria Fusco, diocesan priest and founder of the Congregation of the Sisters of St. John the Baptist (1839-1910);
– Venerable Servant of God John Sullivan, professed priest of the Society of Jesus (1861-1933);
MARTYRDOM
– Servants of God Nikolle Vinçenc Prennushi, O.F.M., archbishop of Durres, Albania, and 37 companions killed between 1945 and 1974;
– Servants of God José Antón Gómez and three companions of the Benedictines of Madrid, Spain, killed 1936;
HEROIC VIRTUES
– Servant of God Thomas Choe Yang-Eop, diocesan priest (1821-1861);
– Servant of God Sosio Del Prete (né Vincenzo), professed priest of the Order of Friars Minor, founder of the Congregation of the Little Servants of Christ the King (1885-1952);
– Servant of God Wenanty Katarzyniec (né Jósef), professed priest of the Order of Friars Minor Conventual (1889-1921);
– Servant of God Maria Consiglia of the Holy Spirity (née Emilia Paqualina Addatis), founder of the Congregation of the Sisters of the Addolorata, Servants of Mary (1845-1900);
– Servant of God Maria of the Incarnation (née Caterina Carrasco Tenorio), founder of the Congregation of the Franciscan Tertiary Sisters of the Flock of Mary (1840-1917);
– Servant of God , founder of the Congregation of the Sisters of the Family of the Sacred Heart of Jesus (1851-1923);
– Servant of God Ilia Corsaro, founder of the Congregation of the Little Missionaries of the Eucharist (1897-1977);
– Servant of God Maria Montserrat Grases García, layperson of the Personal Prelature of the Holy Cross and Opus Dei (1941-1959).
LINKS:
Marian Apparitions (over 2000)  India Marian Shrine Lourdes of the East   Lourdes Feb 11- July 16, Loreto, Italy 1858 
China Marian shrines May 23, 1995 Zarvintisya Ukraine Lourdes Kenya national Marian shrine    Quang Tri Vietnam La Vang 1798  
Links to Related Marian Websites  Angels and Archangels
Doctors_of_the_Church   Acts_Apostles  Roman Catholic Popes  Purgatory  Uniates, 217 2022