Father Corapi's Biography

6^th v, ST COLMAN OF CLOYNE, BISHOP

St. Colman Mac Lenine {Mac Lenine the most excellent}
Saint Colman Mac Lenine, founder and patron of the See of Cloyne, born in Munster, c. 510; died 24 November, 601. He was endowed with extraordinary poetic powers, being styled by his contemporaries "Royal Bard of Munster". The Ardrigh of Ireland gave him Cloyne, in the present County Cork, for his cathedral abbey, in 560, and he laboured for more than forty years in his extensive diocese. Several of his Irish poems are still extant, notably a metrical panegyric on St. Brendan. Colgan mentions a metrical life of St. Senan by him. His feast is observed on 24 November. Another St. Colman is also venerated on the same day, as recorded by St. Aengus in his "Felire": — With Colman of Duth-chuilleann.

COLMAN OF CLOYNE, the “sun-bright bard”, was son of Lenin, born in Munster near the beginning of the sixth century. He was a poet of great skill and became royal bard (that is, chronicler and genealogist as well as poet laureate) at Cashel. He was nearly fifty years old before he became a Christian, and the circumstances of his conversion are said to have been as follows. St Brendan came to Cashel to help in the settlement of a dispute about the succession, and while he was there the grave and relics of St Ailbhe were found. Colman took part in this discovery, and St Brendan observed that hands, which had been hallowed by the touch of such holy remains, should not remain the hands of a pagan. So the bard was baptized by Brendan, and received from him the name of Colman, which was extraordinarily common in the early Irish church. In the Life of St Columba of Terryglass we hear that the boy Columba was given to the care of this Colman, who taught him to read. Having been ordained priest and afterwards consecrated bishop, St Colman preached in Limerick and the eastern pans of Cork, where he was granted land for a church at Cloyne, of which he is venerated as the first bishop. The feast of this St Colman is kept throughout Ireland.

856 St. Flora & Mary Christian martyrs of Cordoba

851 Ss. Flora And Mary, Virgins And Martyrs
In the reign of Abdur Rahman II, king of the Moors at Cordova in Spain, Flora, being of Mohammedan birth by her father but secretly brought up in the Christian faith by her mother, was impeached by her own brother before the judge of the city. This magistrate had her scourged brutally, and then put her into the hands of her brother that he might overcome her resolution. Later she made her escape and took shelter with a sister. Having lain concealed some time, she ventured back to Cordova and prayed publicly in the church of St Acisclus the martyr. There she met with Mary, sister to a deacon who had lately received the crown of martyrdom, and they agreed to give themselves up as Christians to the magistrate, by whose order they were confined where no one had access to them but some loose women. St Eulogius, who was at that time detained in another prison, wrote them an exhortation to martyrdom, in which he told them that no involuntary infamy could harm their souls and that to yield temporarily in hope of better things must not be considered.
   The two girls were eventually beheaded together, declaring they would intercede in Heaven for the release of St Eulogius and the other brethren; and they were in fact set free a week later. 

    Soon after the first monastery of discalced (i.e. barefooted) Carmelite friars was established in a small and dilapidated house at Duruelo. St John entered this new Bethlehem in a perfect spirit of sacrifice, and two others, who renewed their profession on Advent Sunday, 1568, St John taking the new religious name of John-of-the-Cross, joined about two months after. It was a prophetic choice. The fame of the sanctity of this obscure house spread, and St Teresa soon established a second at Pastrana, a third at Mancera, whither she translated that from Duruelo, and in 1570 a fourth, at Alcalá, a college of the university, of which John was made rector.

   His example inspired the religious with a perfect spirit of solitude, humility and mortification, but Almighty God, to purify his heart from all natural weaknesses and attachments, made him pass through the most severe interior and exterior trials. St John, after tasting the first joys of contemplation, found himself deprived of all sensible devotion. This spiritual dryness was followed by interior trouble of mind, scruples and a disrelish of spiritual exercises, and, while the Devil assaulted him with violent temptations, men persecuted him by calumnies. The most terrible of all these pains was that of scrupulosity and interior desolation, which he describes in his book called The Dark Night of the Soul. This again was succeeded by another more grievous trial of spiritual darkness, accompanied with interior pain and temptations in which God seemed to have forsaken him. But in the calm, which followed this terrible tempest, he was wonderfully repaid with divine love and new light. On one occasion an unrestrained young woman of considerable attraction subjected St John to a barefaced attempt. Instead of the burning brand that St Thomas Aquinas used on a like occasion, John used gentle words to persuade her of the error of her ways. By like means but in other circumstances he got the better of another lady, whose temper was so fierce that she was known as Robert the Devil.

St John’s cell measured some ten feet by six, and the one window was so small and high up that he had to stand on a stool by it to see to read his office. He was bloodily beaten—he bore the marks to his dying day—publicly in chapter, by order of Jerome Tostado, vicar general of the Carmelites in Spain and a Consultor of the Inquisition. St John’s were all those sufferings described in St Teresa’s “Sixth Mansion”—insults, slanders, physical pain, agony of soul and temptation to give in. But, “Do not be surprised”, he said in after years, “if I show a great love of suffering; God gave me a high idea of its value when I was in prison at Toledo”. And his immediate answer was his earliest poems, a voice crying in the wilderness:

On the night of the feast-day the Mother of God appeared to her suffering servant. “Be patient, my son,” she seemed to say, “Your trials will soon be over,” A few days later she appeared again, and showed him in vision a window overlooking the river Tagus. “You will go out that way”, she said, “and I will help you.” And so it happened, nine months after his imprisonment began, that John had his opportunity when he was allowed a few minutes exercise. He walked through the building, looking for that window; he recognized it, and went back to his cell. He had already begun to loosen the screws of the door lock that night he broke if off and, though two visiting friars were sleeping close by the window, he let himself down from it on a rope of twisted coverlets and clothes. The rope was too short, he fell down the ramparts to the river bank, picked himself up unhurt, and followed a dog which jumped into an adjoining courtyard. And so he got away, with attendant circumstances that on the face of it appear miraculous.* {*Prescinding from the methods used, it should be borne in mind that juridically opponents of St John had a case. There was a conflict of jurisdiction, but from their point of view Friar John came within the provision in Bd John Soreth’s constitutions concerning rebels, fugitives and the like.}

John made his way to the reformed friary of Beas de Segura and then to the near-by hermitage of Monte Calvario. In 1579 he became head of the college at Baeza, and in 1581 he was chosen prior of Los Martires, near Granada.

   Though the male founder and spiritual leader of the Discalced friars he took little part during these years, when their continued existence hung in the balance, in negotiations and events which led up to the establishment of a separate province for the Discalced in 1580. Instead he began those writings which have made him  a doctor of the Church in mystical theology. In his teaching he was a faithful follower of ancient tradition human life on earth is ordered to an end, which is the perfection of charity and transformation in God, by love. Contemplation is not an end in itself, it does not stop at understanding, but it is for love and for union with God by love, and ultimately involves the experience itself of that union towards which everything is ordered. “There is no better or more necessary work than love”, he says. “We have been created for love.” “God uses nothing but love.” “As love is the union of the Father with the Son, so it is of the human soul with God.”

It is by love that contemplation is attained, and since this love is produced by faith—which alone can bridge the gulf between our understanding and the infinity of God—it is a living and lived faith that is the principle of mystical experience. Such traditional doctrine St John was never wearied of inculcating in his own lofty way and burning words; but that he was at the same time a characteristic son of his age and country a glance at his own design for a “crucifixion” (now preserved in the Carmelite convent at Avila) at once shows. Sometimes the austerities, which he practised, seemed to exceed bounds; he only slept two or three hours in a night, employing the rest in prayer before the Blessed Sacrament. Three things he frequently asked of God that he might not pass one day of his life without suffering something, that he might not die in office, and that he might end his life in humiliation and contempt.
   His confidence in God earned miraculous supplies for his monasteries, which firm confidence in divine providence he called the patrimony of the poor. He was frequently so absorbed in God that he was obliged to do violence to himself to treat of temporal affairs. This love appeared in a certain brightness, which was seen in his countenance on many occasions, especially when he came from the altar. His heart seemed a fire of love that could not be contained within his breast, but showed itself by these exterior marks. By experience in spiritual things and an extraordinary light of the Holy Ghost he had the gift of discerning spirits, and could not be easily imposed upon in what came from God.

After the death of St Teresa in 1582 a disagreement within the ranks of the Discalced friars themselves became more pronounced, St John favouring the moderate policy of the prior provincial, Father Jerome Gracián, against the extremist Father Nicholas Doria, who aimed at separating the Discalced completely from the old stock. After Father Nicholas himself became provincial, the chapter made St John vicar for Andalusia and he applied himself to the correction of certain abuses, especially those arising from the necessity of religious going out of their monasteries for the purpose of preaching. It was his opinion that their vocation and life was primarily contemplative. Thus opposition was raised against him. He founded more friaries, and on the expiry of his term of office went as prior to Granada. The policy of Father Nicholas had so prospered that a chapter held at Madrid in 1588 received a brief from the Holy See authorizing a further separation of the Discalced Carmelites from the Mitigated. In spite of protests the venerable Father Jerome Gracián was deprived of all authority; Father Nicholas Doria was made vicar general; and the one province was divided into six, with a Consultor for each (St John himself was one) to help him in the government of the new congregation. This innovation caused grave discontent, especially among the nuns, and the Venerable Anne-of-Jesus, then prioress at Madrid, obtained from the Holy See a brief confirming their constitutions, without reference to the vicar general. The consequent troubles were eventually composed, but at a chapter held at Whitsun 1591, St John spoke in defence both of Father Jerome Gracián and of the nuns. Father Nicholas Doria had suspected him all along of being in league with them, and he now took the opportunity of reducing St John from all offices to the status of a simple friar and sending him to the remote friary of La Peñuela. Here he spent some months, passing his days in meditation and prayer among the mountains, “for I have less to confess when I am among these rocks than when I am among men.”
But there were those who would not leave St John alone even here. When visiting Seville as vicar provincial he had had occasion to restrict the preaching activities of two friars and to recall them to the observance of their rule. They submitted at the time, but the rebuke had rankled, and now one of them, Father Diego, who had become a Consultor of the congregation, went about over the whole province making inquiries about St John’s life and conduct, trumping up accusations, and boasting that he had sufficient proofs to have him expelled from the order. Many at that time forsook him, afraid of seeming to have any dealings with him, and burnt his letters lest they might be involved in his disgrace. St John in the midst of all this was taken ill, and the provincial ordered him to leave out-of-the-way Peñuela and gave him the choice to go either to Baeza or Ubeda. The first was a convenient convent and had for prior a friend of the saint. At the other Father Francis was prior, the other person whom he had corrected with Father Diego. St John chose this house of Ubeda. The fatigue of his journey made him worse; he suffered great pain, and submitted cheerfully to several operations. But the unworthy prior treated him with inhumanity, forbade any one to see him, changed the infirmarian because he served him with tenderness, and would not allow him any but the ordinary food, refusing him even what seculars sent in for him. This state of affairs was brought to the notice of the provincial who came to Ubeda, did all he could for the saint, and reprimanded Father Francis so sharply that he was brought to repentance for his malice. After suffering acutely for nearly three months, St John died on December 14, 1591, still under the cloud which the ambition of Father Nicholas and the revengefulness of Father Diego had raised against him in the congregation of which he was co-founder and whose life he had been the first to take up.

Immediately after his death there was an outburst of recognition on all hands, and clergy and laity flocked to his funeral. His body was removed to Segovia, the last house of which he had been prior. He was canonized in 1726. St John-of-the-Cross was not learned when compared with some learned doctors, but St Teresa saw in him a most pure soul to whom God had communicated great treasures of light and whose understanding was filled from on high. Her judgement is amply borne out by his writings, principally the poems and their accompanying commentaries, the Ascent of Mount Cannel, the Dark Night of the Soul, the Living Flame of Love and a Spiritual Canticle; and its rightness was superlatively recognized by the Church when, in 1926, he was proclaimed a doctor of the Church for his mystical works. St John’s doctrine was one of ever more suffering and complete abandonment of the soul to God, and that made him harsh and hard to himself; but to others he could be kind, gentle, and forbearing, nor did he pass by or fear material things “Natural things”, he said, “are always lovely; they are the crumbs that fall from God’s table”. He lived the complete renunciation which he preached so powerfully, but, unlike so many lesser ones, he was “free as the spirit of God is free” not tending to reiterated negation and emptiness but positive and full with the fullness of divine love, God and the soul in substantial communion. He united in himself the ecstatic light of the Divine Wisdom with the shattering folly of the despised Christ.