Make a Novena and pray the Rosary to Our Lady of Victory
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.
October is the month of the Rosary since 1868;
2023
23,685 since 20,07

Six to Be Canonized on Feast of Christ the King Nov 23 2014
CAUSES OF SAINTS April  2014
Our Bartholomew Family Prayer List  Here
Acts of the Apostles

Mary Mother of GOD
October 22
1562 St. Peter of Alcantara {see also October 19} “To bear such an insult one must have the patience of Peter of Alcantara.”
“I do not praise poverty for poverty's sake; I praise only that poverty which we patiently endure for the love of our crucified Redeemer and I consider this far more desirable than the poverty we undertake for the sake of poverty itself; for if I thought or believed otherwise, I would not seem to be firmly grounded in faith.” (Letter of Peter to Teresa of Avila).
1622 Bl. Alix Le Clercq nun founded Augustinian Canonesses Congregation of Our Lady from Rome
October 22 – Our Lady of Kazan (Russia) 
A smile appeared on the face of the Virgin when Bernadette recited the Ave Maria 
In Lourdes in 1858, the Virgin Mary introduced herself to Bernadette Soubirous saying: “I am the Immaculate Conception.” At the first apparition, Bernadette clutched her Rosary: "The Lady approved with a nod and she herself held up the Rosary she had over her right arm."
Then, with a gesture both serious and sweet, as if to encourage Bernadette, the Virgin Mary made the sign of the Cross.
During the apparitions at the grotto, Bernadette prayed the Rosary. The Virgin accompanied her, and a smile appeared on her face each time Bernadette recited the Hail Mary.
The Blessed Virgin carried a Rosary in her clasped hands. She asked Bernadette to pray it along with the multitude of visitors, to do penance and to pray for sinners.  Source: www.paroisses-des-jalles.cef.fr
 
Blessed Pope John Paul II 1920-2005 feast day October 22nd

  15 Promises of the Virgin Mary to those who recite the Rosary

We ought to deal kindly with all, and to manifest those qualities which spring naturally from a heart tender and full of Christian charity; such as affability, love and humility. These virtues serve wonderfully to gain the hearts of men, and to encourage them to embrace things that are more repugnant to nature. -- St Vincent de Paul
         St. Mary Salome One of the “Three Marys” who served Christ
        St. Mark First bishop of Jerusalem not of Jewish descent
  200 St. Abercius Marcellus Bishop of Hieropolis in Phrygia apologist
  270 St. Philip Martyr bishop of Fermo, Italy
  304 St. Philip of Heraclea Bishop of Heraclea martyr
        Sts. Alexander, Heraclius, and Companions Martyrs
  314 St. Mellon First bishop of Rouen ordained by Pope St. Stephen and sent there to preach the Gospel
  395 St. Nepotian Bishop of Clermont; succeeded the famed St. Illidius in 386; Nepotian's successor was St. Artemius
4th v. St. Cordula, who was one of the companions of St. Ursula.
  522 St. Verecundus Bishop of Verona
  668 St. Nunctus Abbot of a monastery near Merida martyr
  730 St. Moderan Benedictine bishop of Rennes France
  851 St. Alodia Martyr confessor daughter of a Muslim father Christian mother; This great era of the martyrs in Spain began in the year 850, under the Moorish Abdur Rahman II,
  874 St. Donatus of Fiesole Irishman became bishop of Fiesole
  884 St. Bertharius Benedictine abbot martyr
1562 St. Peter of Alcantara {see also October 19} “To bear such an insult one must have the patience of Peter of Alcantara.”
Quote: “I do not praise poverty for poverty's sake; I praise only that poverty which we patiently endure for the love of our crucified Redeemer and I consider this far more desirable than the poverty we undertake for the sake of poverty itself; for if I thought or believed otherwise, I would not seem to be firmly grounded in faith.” (Letter of Peter to Teresa of Avila).
1622 Bl. Alix Le Clercq nun founded Augustinian Canonesses Congregation of Our Lady from Rome
October 22 - Our Lady of Kazan (1579, Russia)
In 1579, the icon of Our Lady of Kazan was discovered by a young girl of ten, at the site of a house that had been destroyed in a fire, a place as tradition recalls was revealed to her in a dream. The miraculous icon was travelling with the Russian troops when Moscow was liberated of its Polish invader at the end of the “Time of Trouble” in 1612

October 22 - Our Lady of Kazan (Russia)  He Limited Neither the Number nor the Time
             Jesus promised that, in His Church, there would be miracles greater than those which He had performed. He limited neither the number nor the time when these miracles would happen, so that, as long as the Church exists, we will always see the hand of the Lord expressing His power by extraordinary events. (…)
These perceptible signs of the absolute divine power always predict serious facts, expressing either God’s mercy and goodness, or His justice and indignation. This is done for His greater glory and for the good of many souls. May these events be for us a source of graces and blessings; contributing to enlivening the faith in our life, giving us an active faith, a faith that encourages us to do good works and to avoid all evil
in order to make us worthy of God’s infinite mercy in this life and for eternity.

Saint John Bosco (1815-1888)  Apparition of Blessed Virgin on the Mountain of La Salette, written in Turin, 1875
October 22 - Our Lady of Kazan (Russia)
Mary Has Revealed the Remedy
Dear brothers and sisters of Russia, you are the children of Mary, of the best mother one could ever dream of, a Mother who never abandons her children. This is why she, who the faithful of your country venerate as Our Lady of Kazan and patroness of Russia, cast her maternal gaze on your fatherland at Fatima in 1917 when she “declared war” against Lenin's revolution.

That revolution was, by its very essence, a rebellion against God, and therefore the work of Satan. (…) At Fatima, Mary revealed the remedy to us. Before people even knew that Lenin was on his way to Russia to set off the revolution, she called out to Western Christianity at six different times—from May 13th to October 13th—to pray, to convert, to do penance and to consecrate the whole world to his Immaculate Heart…

Father Werenfried van Straaten Appeal broadcast on Radio and Television to the Russian Nation, 1991.
In Fatima, la Russie et Jean Paul II, (Fatima, Russia and John Paul II) Timothy Tindal-Robertson, Téqui, Paris, 1993
October 22 - Our Lady of the Underground (Cairo, Egypt, 12th C.) - “Be Not Afraid!” By John Paul II
Mary had no fear
On 22 October 1978, when I inherited the Ministry of Peter in Rome, more than anything else, it was this experience and devotion to Mary in my native land which I carried with me. “Be not afraid!” Christ said to the apostles (cf. Lk 24:36) and to the women (cf. Mt 28:10) after the resurrection. According to the Gospel, these words were not addressed to Mary. Strong in her faith, she had no fear. Mary's participation in the victory of Christ became clear to me above all from the experience of my people.  Pope John Paul II Be Not Afraid, p. 220
The Shrine of Our Lady of Rocamadour (I) October 22 - OUR LADY OF THE ROCK (Rocamadour, France)

According to legend, Rocamadour was the home of an early Christian hermit named Zaccheus of Jericho. It is believed that he had conversed with Jesus himself, and that he died around 70 AD. This Zaccheus is said to have been the husband of St Veronica, who wiped the face of Jesus as he climbed to Calvary.

At some point after the hermit's death and burial in Rocamadour, the site became a place of pilgrimage. Some claim the town was named for the hermit because he was a “lover of rock” (roc amator). Zaccheus is also said to have brought a statue of the Black Virgin to Rocamadour, though the statue is generally dated to the 9th century. Due to the double attraction of the tomb of Zaccheus and the statue of the Virgin, pilgrims began to flock to Rocamadour. Many reported experiencing miraculous healings and conversions at the shrine.

The situation of the shrine is extraordinary, amid medieval religious fortifications giddily perched atop a precipice, surrounded by a spectacular expanse of barren countryside. The miraculous statue is equally remarkable.
Our Lady appears to be resting her weight on her hands, which are supported on the arms of her chair;
the Child is balanced on her left knee.
A major event occurred in 1166, when an ancient grave and sepulcher containing an undecayed body was discovered on the cliff of Rocamadour, near the Chapel of Our Lady. This was believed to be the early Christian hermit St Amadour, who is often equated with Zaccheus. It is said that Amadour, a faithful servant of the Blessed Virgin, came to Gaul and built the first chapel of the Blessed Virgin Mary on French soil.
See http://www.sacred-destinations.com/france/rocamadour-shrine-of-our-lady-of-rocamadour.htm
Blessed Pope John Paul II 1920-2005
“Open wide the doors to Christ,” urged John Paul II during the homily at the Mass when he was installed as pope in 1978.
Born in Wadowice, Poland, Karol Jozef Wojtyla had lost his mother, father and older brother before his 21st birthday. Karol’s promising academic career at Krakow’s Jagiellonian University was cut short by the outbreak of World War II. While working in a quarry and a chemical factory, he enrolled in an “underground” seminary in Kraków. Ordained in 1946, he was immediately sent to Rome where he earned a doctorate in theology.

Back in Poland, a short assignment as assistant pastor in a rural parish preceded his very fruitful chaplaincy for university students. Soon he earned a doctorate in philosophy and began teaching that subject at Poland’s University of Lublin. Communist officials allowed him to be appointed auxiliary bishop of Krakow in 1958, considering him a relatively harmless intellectual. They could not have been more wrong!

He attended all four sessions of Vatican II and contributed especially to its Pastoral Constitution on the Church in the Modern World. Appointed as archbishop of Krakow in 1964, he was named a cardinal three years later.
Elected pope in October 1978, he took the name of his short-lived, immediate predecessor. Pope John Paul II was the first non-Italian pope in 455 years. In time, he made pastoral visits to 124 countries, including several with small Christian populations. He promoted ecumenical and interfaith initiatives, especially the 1986 Day of Prayer for World Peace in Assisi. He visited Rome’s Main Synagogue and the Western Wall in Jerusalem; he also established diplomatic relations between the Holy See and Israel. He improved Catholic-Muslim relations and in 2001 visited a mosque in Damascus, Syria.
The Great Jubilee of the Year 2000, a key event in John Paul’s ministry, was marked by special celebrations in Rome and elsewhere for Catholics and other Christians. Relations with the Orthodox Churches improved considerably during his ministry as pope.
“Christ is the center of the universe and of human history” was the opening line of his 1979 encyclical, Redeemer of the Human Race. In 1995, he described himself to the United Nations General Assembly as “a witness to hope.”

His 1979 visit to Poland encouraged the growth of the Solidarity movement there and the collapse of communism in central and eastern Europe 10 years later. He began World Youth Day and traveled to several countries for those celebrations. He very much wanted to visit China and the Soviet Union but the governments in those countries prevented that.
One of the most well-remembered photos of his pontificate was his one-on-one conversation in 1983 with Mehmet Ali Agca, who had attempted to assassinate him two years earlier.

In his 27 years of papal ministry, John Paul wrote 14 encyclicals and five books, canonized 482 saints and beatified 1,338 people.
In the last years of his life, he suffered from Parkinson’s disease and was forced to cut back on some of his activities.

Pope Benedict XVI beatified John Paul II on May 1, 2011, Divine Mercy Sunday.
Comment:  Before John Paul’s funeral Mass in St. Peter’s Square, hundreds of thousands of people had waited patiently for a brief moment to pray before his body, which lay in state inside St. Peter’s for several days. The media coverage of his funeral was unprecedented. Cardinal Joseph Ratzinger, then dean of the College of Cardinals and later Pope Benedict XVI, presided at the funeral Mass and concluded his homily by saying: “None of us can ever forget how, in that last Easter Sunday of his life, the Holy Father, marked by suffering, came once more to the window of the Apostolic Palace and one last time gave his blessing urbi et orbi [‘to the city and to the world’]. “We can be sure that our beloved pope is standing today at the window of the Father’s house, that sees us and blesses us. Yes, bless us, Holy Father. We entrust your dear soul to the Mother of God, your Mother, who guided you each day and who will guide you now to the glory of her Son, our Lord Jesus Christ. Amen.”
Quote:  In his 1999 Letter to the Elderly, Pope John Paul II wrote: “Grant, O Lord of life,...when the moment of our definitive ‘passage’ comes, that we may face it with serenity, without regret for what we shall leave behind. For in meeting you, after having sought you for so long, we shall find once more every authentic good which we have known here on earth, in the company of all those who have gone before us marked with the sign of faith and hope....Amen.”


1st century St. Mary Salome One of the “Three Marys” who served Christ
Hierosólymis sanctæ Maríæ Salóme, matris sanctórum Jacóbi et Joánnis Apostolórum, quæ in Evangelio légitur circa Dómini sepultúram sollícita.
    At Jerusalem, St. Mary Salome, the mother of the apostles James and John, who is referred to in the Gospel as having cared for the burial of our Lord.
She was the mother of St. James the Great and St. John, and was the wife of Zebedee.
Mary Salome witnessed the Crucifixion and was among
the women at the burial place on the day of the Resurrection.

St. Mark First bishop of Jerusalem not of Jewish descent
Item Hierosólymis beáti Marci Epíscopi, claríssimi et doctíssimi viri, qui primus ex Géntibus Ecclésiam Hierosolymórum suscépit regéndam, ac, non multo post, sub Antoníno Imperatóre, martyrii méruit palmam.
    At Jerusalem, blessed Bishop Mark, a noble and learned man, who was the first Gentile to govern the Church of Jerusalem.  His brief episcopate was rewarded by the palm of martyrdom under Emperor Antoninus.
 He is reported to have been martyred after two decades.
200 St. Abercius Marcellus Bishop of Hieropolis in Phrygia; apologist
Hierápoli, in Phrygia, sancti Abércii Epíscopi, qui sub Marco Antoníno Imperatóre cláruit.
    At Hieropolis in Phrygia, St. Abercius, bishop, who flourished under Emperor Marcus Antoninus.
whose hagiography dates to the second century. The bishop of Hieropolis in Phrygia, he made a visit to Rome at the age of seventy-two. In Rome, Abercius was supposedly commanded by Emperor Marcus Aurelius to rid his daughter, Lucilla, of a demon. Following this event, Abercius is recorded as visiting Syria and the Euphrates River. The details of Abercius' life led to debate through the centuries concerning their authenticity and veracity. It is known that Abercius was the bishop of Heiropolis in the area called Phrygia Salutaris. In the original “Inscriptions of Abercius,” an epitaph on a stele now in the Vatican, the saintly bishop comments on the dazzling seal of Baptism that unites Christians everywhere. He speaks of the Holy Eucharist as well. Later interpretations of this “Inscription” were written in Greek and widely embellished, leading to debate.
Abercius appears in Greek records in the tenth century but was not included in St. Jerome's martyrology.
200 St Abercius, Bishop of Hieropolis
 There lived in Phrygia Salutaris during the second century a certain Abercius Marcellus, who was bishop of Hieropolis and who, while in his seventy-second year, made a visit to Rome. His homeward journey was taken through Syria and Mesopotamia, he visited Nisibis, and everywhere he went he met Christians, whose foreheads bore the shining seal of baptism and whose souls were nourished with the body and blood of Christ, the virgin-born, under the forms of bread and wine. Abercius when he returned home prepared a tomb for himself and had carved thereon an epitaph which, in symbolical and to the non-Christian baffling terms, briefly described the journey which had made so deep an impression on the Greek disciple of the all-seeing and universal Shepherd, who had gone to Rome “to contemplate majesty”.
    A Greek hagiographer made use of the epitaph as the basis of a fictitious account of the life of St Abercius. According to this ingenious narrative the bishop made so many converts by his preaching and miracles that he deserved to be called “equal to the Apostles” and his fame reached the ears of Marcus Aurelius. The expedition to Rome was made in consequence of a summons from the emperor, whose daughter Lucilla was afflicted by a devil (the symbolical gold-clad queen of the epitaph becomes the empress).  St Abercius successfully exorcized this evil spirit and commanded it to transport a great stone altar from the Roman hippodrome to his episcopal city, where it should provide materials for his tomb. Other episodes were added from the legends of other saints, and the writer appended to his tale a transcription of the original genuine epitaph of Abercius.
   This epitaph was formerly regarded with nearly as much suspicion as the vita of which it formed a part, until in 1882 the English archaeologist, W. M. Ramsay, discovered at Kelendres, near Synnada, an inscribed stone bearing the equivalent of the date A.D. 216.  It was a memorial inscription to one Alexander, the son of Antony, which was found to correspond almost word for word with the first and last verses of the epitaph of Abercius.  In the following year Ramsay found, built into the walls of the baths at Hieropolis, further fragments that supplied much of the part of the epitaph of Abercius missing from the other stone.  With these two inscriptions and the text given in the life of the saint an authentic text of great value was restored.  But the claim of Abercius to be a Christian was still not admitted by everyone to be established.  On account of the symbolism with which it was expressed, interpreters of the inscription identified him as a priest of Cybele or of Attis or of some syncretistic cult, and it was only after long and lively controversies that it was generally admitted that the Abercius of the inscription was a Christian bishop.  He has been venerated liturgically among the Greeks since the tenth century, and he is named today in the Roman Martyrology, but as bishop of Hierapolis (the see of St Papias) instead of Hieropolis, an error found in the bogus life.
  The inscriptions which Sir W. M. Ramsay found at Hieropolis, and which now, by the gracious act of the discoverer, adorns the Christian Museum at the Lateran have created a considerable literature. All the discussion, which has since arisen, has added very little to the interpretation that the Anglican Bishop Lightfoot, with sure scholarly instinct, published in vol. i of his Ignatius and Polycarp (1885). Such sceptical critics as G. Ficker and A. Dieterich have not produced a fragment of evidence that would raise a doubt regarding the Christian character of the inscription. The work of F. J, Dölger, Ichthys (see especially vol. ii, 1922, pp. 454—507), may be recommended as replying effectively, along with many other vindications, to the objections, which have been urged, Dom Leclercq’s article in DAC. (vol. i, cc. 66—87), provides good illustrations and a full bibliography the same scholar’s article in the Catholic Encyclopedia, vol. i, pp. 40—41, prints the Greek text of the inscription with an English translation. With regard to the Life of Abercius, the two more ancient texts of this Greek fiction have been critically edited by T. Nissen, S. Abercii Vita (1912) though historically worthless, it contains geographical data of value, and its quotations from Bardesanes are of curious interest. Writing in 1935 Father Thurston said he was inclined considerably to modify certain views expressed by him in the second of two articles on St Abercius in The Month for May and July 1890.
270 St. Philip Martyr bishop of Fermo, Italy
Apud Firmum, in Picéno, natális sancti Philíppi, Epíscopi et Mártyris.
    At Fermo in Piceno, the birthday of St. Philip, bishop and martyr.
He suffered martyrdom in the reign of Emperor Aurelian.
Little is known of him save that his relics are preserved in the local cathedral of Fermo.
304 St. Philip of Heraclea Bishop of Heraclea martyr.
Hadrianópoli, in Thrácia, natális sanctórum Mártyrum Philíppi Epíscopi, Sevéri Presbyteri, Eusébii et Hermétis; qui, sub Juliáno Apóstata, post cárceres et flagélla, incéndio cremáti sunt.
    At Adrianople in Thrace, the birthday of the holy martyrs Philip, a bishop, Severus, a priest, Eusebius, and Hermes.  After being imprisoned and scourged, they were burned alive in the time of Julian the Apostate.
During the persecution of the Church under Emperor Diocletian, Philip was arrested along with his deacon Severus and two other clergy, Hermes and Eusebius. Taken before the magistrate, Blassus, they were ordered to hand over the Sacred Scripture, but refused. Moved to Adrianople, they were burned at the stake. All four share the same feast day.

304 Ss. Philip, Bishop Of Heraclea, And His Companions, Martyrs
   Philip, Bishop of Heraclea, the metropolis of Thrace, was a martyr of Christ in the persecution of Diocletian. Having discharged every duty of a faithful minister as deacon and priest, he was raised to the episcopal dignity and governed that church with virtue and prudence when it was shaken by persecution.  To extend and perpetuate the work of God he trained many disciples in sacred learning and solid piety.  Two of the most eminent among them had the happiness to be companions of his martyrdom, namely, Severus, a priest, and Hermes, a deacon, who was formerly the first magistrate of the city, but after he was engaged in the ministry earned his livelihood with his hands, and brought up his son to do the same. 
When Diocletian’s first edicts against the Christians were issued, many advised the bishop to leave the city; but he would not stir, continuing to exhort the brethren to constancy and patience. Aristomachus, an officer, came by the governor’s order to seal up the door of the church. Philip said to him, “Do you imagine that God dwells within walls, and not rather in the hearts of men?” and continued to hold his assembly outside.  The next day officers came and set their seal upon the sacred vessels and books. The faithful who beheld this were much grieved; but the bishop stood leaning against the door of the church, encouraged them with burning words, and refused to leave his post.
  Afterwards the governor, Bassus, finding Philip and many of his flock keeping the Lord’s Day assembled before the church, gave orders that they should be brought before him. “Which of you”, he asked, “is the teacher of the Christians?” Philip replied, “I am”. Bassus said, “You know that the emperor has forbidden your assemblies. Give up to me the vessels of gold and silver which you use and the books which you read.”  The bishop answered, “The vessels we will give you, for it is not by precious metal but by charity that God is honoured. But the sacred books it becomes neither you to demand nor me to surrender.”  The governor ordered executioners to be called, and commanded one among them to torture Philip, who bore his torments with invincible courage.  Hermes told the governor that it was not in his power to destroy the word of God, even though he should take away all the writings in which the true doctrine is contained, and in reply Bassus had him scourged.  After this he was taken with Publius, the governor’s assistant, to the place where the sacred writings and plate were hid. Publius would have taken away some of the vessels, but being hindered by Hermes he gave him such a blow on the face that blood flowed.  The governor was provoked at Publius for this action, and ordered the wound to be dressed.  He then ordered Philip and the other prisoners to be brought to the market-place, and the church roof to be stripped. In the meantime soldiers burned the sacred writings the flames mounting so high as to frighten the bystanders.  This being told to Philip in the market-place, he spoke at great length of the vengeance with which God threatens the wicked and told the people how their gods and temples had been often burned.
  Then a pagan priest appeared in the market-place with his ministers, who brought with them the necessary preparations for a sacrifice, and the governor Bassus came, followed by a multitude, some of whom pitied the suffering Christians others, especially the Jews, clamoured loudly against them.  Bassus pressed the bishop to sacrifice to the gods, to the emperors and to the fortune of the city. Pointing at a large and beautiful statue of Hercules, he bid him just to touch it Philip replied by expounding the value of graven images to stone-carvers but their helplessness to worshippers.  Then, turning to Hermes, Bassus asked if he, at least, would sacrifice. “I will not”, replied Hermes, “I am a Christian.” Bassus asked, “If we can persuade Philip to offer sacrifice, will you follow his example?” Hermes answered he would not neither could they persuade Philip. After many useless threats and pressing them to sacrifice at least to the emperors, Bassus ordered them to be carried to prison. As they went along, some of the rabble pushed Philip and threw him down; he got up again with a smiling face. Many admired his patience, and the martyrs entered the prison joyfully, singing a psalm of thanksgiving to God. A few days after, they were allowed to stay at the house of one Pancras, near the prison, where many Christians and some neophytes came to them to be instructed, and later were removed to a prison near the theatre, which had a door into that building, with a secret entry. They there received at night the crowds that came to visit them.
   In the meantime, Bassus went out of office at the end of his term and Justin succeeded him. The Christians were much disappointed at this change for Bassus often yielded to reason and his wife had for some time been a Christian herself but Justin was a violent man.  Zoilus, the magistrate of the city, brought Philip before him, and Justin declared once more what was the emperor’s order, and pressed him to sacrifice. Philip answered, “I am a Christian, and cannot do what you require. You can punish our refusal, but you cannot force our compliance.”  Justin threatened him with torture, and the bishop replied, “You may torment, but will not conquer me no power can induce me to sacrifice”.  He was told he would be dragged by the feet through the streets and thrown into prison to suffer anew.  “God grant it may be so”, was Philip’s comment. Then Justin told the soldiers to tie his feet and drag him along.  They dashed him against the stones so roughly that he was torn and bruised all over, and the Christians carried him in their arms when he was brought back to his dungeon.
  The persecutors had long been in quest of the priest Severus, who had hidden himself. Moved by the Holy Ghost, he at length surrendered and was committed to prison.  Hermes was firm in his examination before Justin, and was treated in the same manner. The three martyrs were kept imprisoned in a bad place for seven months and then removed to Adrianople, where they were confined in a private house till the arrival of the governor.  The next day, holding his court at the Baths, Justin had Philip brought before him and beaten till his flesh was a pulp.  His endurance astonished the executioners and Justin himself, who remanded him to prison.  Hermes was next examined. The officers of the court were favourable to him because he had been magistrate of Heraclea and a popular one.  But he persisted in his profession, and was sent back to prison, where the martyrs joyfully gave thanks to Jesus Christ for this beginning of their victory.  Three days after this, Justin brought them again before his tribunal, and having in vain pressed Philip to obey the emperors, said to Hermes, “If the approach of death makes this man think life not worth preserving, do not you be insensible to its blessings. Offer sacrifice.”  Hermes replied by denouncing idolatry, so that Justin, enraged, cried out, “You speak as if you wanted to make me a Christian.”
Having then consulted his assessor and others, he pronounced sentence: “We order Philip and Hermes who, despising the commands of the emperor, have rendered themselves unworthy of the name and rights of Roman citizens, to be burned, that others may learn to obey.”
  They went joyfully to the stake. Philip’s feet were so mutilated that he could not walk, and had to be carried. Hermes also walked with much difficulty, and said to him, “Master, let us hasten to go to the Lord. Why should we be concerned about our feet, since we shall have no more use for them?” Then he said to the crowds that followed, “the Lord revealed to me that I must suffer. While I was asleep, methought I saw a dove as white as snow, which rested on my head. Then it descended upon my breast and offered me food that was very sweet to the taste. I knew that it was the Lord that called me, and was pleased to honour me with martyrdom.”  At the place of punishment the executioners, according to custom, covered Philip’s feet and legs with earth up to the knees, and tied his hands behind his back.  They likewise made Hermes go down into the ditch whereat, having to support himself on a stick because of the weakness of his feet, he exclaimed laughing, “Well, demon, you don’t help me even here.”
Before the executioners lighted the fire Hermes called Velogius, a Christian, and said to him, “I implore you, by our Saviour Jesus Christ, tell my son Philip from me to restore whatever was committed to my charge, that I may incur no fault; even the laws of this world ordain it. Tell him also, that he is young and must work for his living as he has seen me do; and behave himself well to everybody.”  Then his hands were tied, and fire was set to the pile. The martyrs praised and gave thanks to God as long as they were able to speak. Their bodies were found entire:  Philip, a venerable old man, seemed to have had his youth restored, and his hands were stretched out as in prayer Hermes with a clear countenance, only his ears a little livid. Justin ordered their bodies to be thrown into the river, but some citizens of Adrianople went in boats with nets, and fished them out. Severus the priest, who had been left alone in prison, when he was informed of their martyrdom, rejoiced at their glory, and earnestly besought God not to think him unworthy to partake in it, since he had confessed His name with them.  He was heard, and suffered martyrdom the day following.  The order for burning the Holy Scriptures and destroying the churches points out the time of their suffering to have been after the edicts of Diocletian.  The Roman Martyrology erroneously puts it in the time of Julian the Apostate, and adds the name of a St Eusebius who does not belong to this group.
The martyrdom of SS. Philip, Hermes and Severus may be counted among the best attested of the episodes of the Diocletian persecution. It is commemorated on this same day in the Syriac breviarium of the early fourth century. There is, moreover, a certain indirect confirmation in the reference made to it in the persia of SS. Gurius and companions (see Gebhatdt and Dobschutz in their edition of this last Text und Untersuchungen, vol. xxxvii, p. 6). The Latin text of the acts of Philip of Heraclea has been printed by Ruinart, and by the Bollandists, October, vol. ix. H. Leclercq provides a French translation in Les Martyrs, vol. ii, pp. 238—257. Cf. also P. Franchi de’ Cavalieri in Studi e Testi, no. 27, Note agiografiche, fascicule 5, and 175, 9.
Sts. Alexander, Heraclius, and Companions Martyrs.
Item sanctórum Mártyrum Alexándri Epíscopi, Heraclíi mílitis, et Sociórum.
    Also, the holy martyrs Alexander, a bishop, Heraclius, a soldier, and their companions.
Alexander was a bishop who preached the faith. He was arrested and tortured, converting his guard, Heraclius, during his imprisonment. Others at the prison joined them in martyrdom.
314 St. Mellon First bishop of Rouen.  
Rotómagi sancti Melánii Epíscopi, qui, a sancto Stéphano Papa ordinátus, illuc ad prædicándum Evangélium missus est.
    At Rouen, St. Melanius, bishop, who was ordained by Pope St. Stephen and sent there to preach the Gospel.
France. A native of Cardiff, Wales, he is listed as Mallonous, Mellouns, and Melanius.
He was converted while in Rome and sent to France as a missionary by Pope St. Stephen.
St Mallonus, Or Mellon, Bishop Of Rouen
The name Mallonus (written Melanius in the Roman Martyrology) appears as that of the first bishop of Rouen in ancient lists and he lived perhaps in the earlier part of the fourth century, but nothing is known about him.  According to late and worthless legends he was a pagan Briton who was converted in Rome and sent by Pope St Stephen I to preach the gospel to the Gauls. At the village near Cardiff called in Welsh Llanlleurog the church is dedicated in his honour and the place is now known as Saint Mellons. Possibly this is the origin of the idea that he was a native of Cardiff.
There are three short Latin lives of St Mallonus, which are printed in the Acta Sanctorum, October, vol. ix, and in Sauvage (Ann de S. Mellon, 1884), but, as Vacandard maintains (Vie de Saint Ouen, p. 92), these biographies date only from the twelfth century and can deserve no confidence. See also Duchesne, Fastes Épiscopaux, vol. ii, pp. 200—203; and LBS., vol. iii, p. 466.
395 St. Nepotian Bishop of Clermont succeeded the famed St. Illidius in 386; Nepotian's successor was St. Artemius
also listed as Neptiamus. He succeeded the famed St. Illidius in 386. Clermont was blessed with a vast roster of sainted bishops. Nepotian's successor was St. Artemius.
4th v. St. Cordula, who was one of the companions of St. Ursula.
Apud Colóniam Agrippínam sanctæ Córdulæ, quæ, cum esset una ex sodálibus sanctæ Ursulæ, atque aliárum supplíciis et cædibus pertérrita se occultásset, postrídie, ejus rei pænitens, se ultro patefécit Hunnis, et, novíssima ómnium, martyrii corónam accépit.
    At Cologne, St. Cordula, who was one of the companions of St. Ursula.  Being terrified by the punishments and slaughter of the others, she hid herself, but repenting her deed, on the next day she declared herself to the Huns of her own accord, and thus was the last of them all to receive the crown of martyrdom.
Von Balthasar used her story in his book Cordula oder der Ernstfall (1966), later published in English as The Moment of Christian Witness. Little is known about her, except that she was one of the 11,000 companions of St Ursula, who made a pilgrimage to Rome and ended up being martyred at Cologne. As Cordula witnessed the massacre of her 10,999 companions, she took fright and hid in the ship. Ashamed of her cowardly (but very human) action, she came out the next day and was promptly martyred - which is why her feast (22 October) is the day after that of St Ursula and her company.
522 St. Verecundus Bishop of Verona Italy.
Verónæ sancti Verecúndi, Epíscopi et Confessóris.    At Verona, St. Verecundius, bishop and confessor.
The details of his labors are lost but the Goths ruled Verona at the time. St. Valens succeeded him.
668 St. Nunctus Abbot of a monastery near Merida martyr.
 also called Noint.
The abbot of a monastery near Merida, Spain, he was murdered by a group of robbers. He was venerated as a martyr.
730 St. Moderan Benedictine bishop of Rennes France.
from 703-720. He made a pilgrimage to Rome and resigned his see to become a hermit in Berceto Abbey, in Parma, Italy.
He is also called Moran and Moderammus.
851 St. Alodia Martyr confessor daughter of a Muslim father Christian mother.
Oscæ, in Hispánia, sanctárum Vírginum Nunilónis et Alódiæ sorórum, quæ, a Saracénis ob fídei confessiónem capitáli senténtia punítæ, martyrium consummárunt.
    At Huesca in Spain, the holy virgins Nunilo and Alodia, sisters, who endured martyrdom by being condemned to capital punishment by the Saracens for the confession of the faith.
in Huesca, Spain. Alodia and her sister, Nunilo, were caught up in the persecutions conducted by Abdal-Rabman II, the ruler of Cordoba. Alodia and Nunilo dedicated themselves to Christ, despite their father's disapproval, and were arrested.
When they refused to deny Christ, they were placed in a brothel and later beheaded.
851 SS. NUNILO AND ALODIA, VIRGINS AND MARTYRS
This great era of the martyrs in Spain began in the year 850, under the Moorish Abdur Rahman II, and these two maidens were among the numberless martyrs who in those days sealed their fidelity to God with their blood. They were sisters, living at Huesca, their father being a Mohammedan and their mother a Christian.
After the death of her first husband, she was so foolish as to take a second who also was a Mohammedan.  Her two daughters, who had been brought up in the Christian faith, had much to suffer from the brutality of their stepfather, who was a person of importance. They were also pestered by many suitors to marry, but having decided to serve God in the state of virginity they obtained leave to go to the house of a Christian aunt.
When the laws of Abdur Rahman were published against the Christians, they were too well known by their family and the repute of their zeal and piety not to be soon arrested. They appeared before the kadi not only undaunted but with a holy joy. He employed flattery and promises to try to work them into compliance, and proceeded to threats.  When these failed him, he put them into the hands of wicked women, hoping these would be able to insinuate themselves into the hearts of the Christian women.  But Christ enlightened and protected them, and the temptresses were obliged to declare to the judge that nothing could conquer their resolution. He therefore condemned them to be beheaded, which was accordingly done, and their passion is mentioned in the Roman Martyrology on this day.
Our information is all, practically speaking, derived from the Memoriale Sanctorum of St Eulogius. The relevant passages are quoted and commented upon in the Acta Sanctorum, October, vol. ix.
874 St. Donatus of Fiesole; Irishman, became bishop of Fiesole
In Túscia sancti Donáti Scoti, Epíscopi Fæsuláni.
    In Tuscany, St. Donatus of Scotland, bishop of Fiesole.
Italy. Traveling through that city while returning from a pilgrimage to Rome in 829, Donatus entered the cathedral. Candles caught light and bells rang, prompting the people to elect him bishop.
He wasa noted scholar and became advisor to Lothair I and his son, Louis II.

876 ST DONATUS, BISHOP OF FIES0LE   
THE tradition of Fiesole is that Donatus was a man of Irish birth who in the early part of the ninth century made a pilgrimage to Rome. On the return journey he arrived at Fiesole at a time when the clergy and people were gathered together to elect a new bishop, praying earnestly that the Holy Ghost would send them one who would be a true pastor in the manifold troubles with which they were beset. No one would have taken any notice of the stranger Donatus as he entered the cathedral, for he was an insignificant little man, but at the moment he crossed the threshold the bells began to ring and all the lamps and candles were kindled without human agency. This was taken to be a sign from Heaven in favour of Donatus, and he was unanimously acclaimed bishop.
The life of St Donatus is interspersed with verses and an epitaph, supposed to have been written by himself, according to which he was an enthusiastic teacher of grammar and prosody and a trusted servant of King Lothair I and his son Louis II. One of the poems describes the beauty of Ireland. The feast of St Donatus of Fiesole is observed today throughout Ireland.
There is a biography—in fact more than one—printed in the Acta Sanctorum, October, vol. ix. See further DNB, vol. xv, p. 216; M. Esposito in the Journal of Theological Studies, vol. xxxiii (1923), p. 129 L. Gougaud, Les saints irlandais hors d’Irlande (1936), p. 76 A. M. Tommasini, Irish Saints in Italy (1937), pp. 383—394 and J. F. Kenney, Sources for the Early History of Ireland, vol. i, pp. 601—602.
884 St. Bertharius Benedictine abbot martyr.
A member of the royal house of France, he became abbot of Monte Cassino, in Italy, in 856. Invading Saracens martyred him and several companions in the chapel. An altar in Monte Cassino commemorates his death.
1562 St. Peter of Alcantara {see also October 19}
(1499-1562) 
Peter was a contemporary of well-known 16th-century Spanish saints, including Ignatius of Loyola and John of the Cross. He served as confessor to St. Teresa of Avila. Church reform was a major issue in Peter’s day, and he directed most of his energies toward that end. His death came one year before the Council of Trent ended.
Born into a noble family (his father was the governor of Alcantara in Spain), Peter studied law at Salamanca University and, at 16, joined the so-called Observant Franciscans (also known as the discalced, or barefoot, friars). While he practiced many penances, he also demonstrated abilities which were soon recognized. He was named the superior of a new house even before his ordination as a priest; at the age of 39, he was elected provincial; he was a very successful preacher. Still, he was not above washing dishes and cutting wood for the friars. He did not seek attention; indeed, he preferred solitude.
Peter’s penitential side was evident when it came to food and clothing. It is said that he slept only 90 minutes each night. While others talked about Church reform, Peter’s reform began with himself. His patience was so great that a proverb arose:
"To bear such an insult one must have the patience of Peter of Alcantara."
In 1554, Peter, having received permission, formed a group of Franciscans who followed the Rule of St. Francis with even greater rigor. These friars were known as Alcantarines. Some of the Spanish friars who came to North and South America in the 16th, 17th and 18th centuries were members of this group. At the end of the 19th century, the Alcantarines were joined with other Observant friars to form the Order of Friars Minor.
As spiritual director to St. Teresa, Peter encouraged her in promoting the Carmelite reform. His preaching brought many people to religious life, especially to the Secular Franciscan Order, the friars and the Poor Clares.  He was canonized in 1669.
Comment: Poverty was a means and not an end for Peter. The goal was following Christ in ever greater purity of heart. Whatever obstructed that path could be eliminated with no real loss. The philosophy of our consumer age—you are worth what you own—may find Peter of Alcantara’s approach severe. Ultimately his approach is life-giving while consumerism is deadly.
Quote: “I do not praise poverty for poverty's sake; I praise only that poverty which we patiently endure for the love of our crucified Redeemer and I consider this far more desirable than the poverty we undertake for the sake of poverty itself; for if I thought or believed otherwise, I would not seem to be firmly grounded in faith.” (Letter of Peter to Teresa of Avila).
1622 Bl. Alix Le Clercq nun founded Augustinian Canonesses Congregation of Our Lady from Rome.
January 9th (France) In France, the name Alix has a Name Day celebrated on January 9th.
October 22nd (Catholic Church) The Catholic Church has designated
October 22nd as an official Saint Day for the baby name Alix in honor of Bl. Alix Le Clercq.
Alix Le Clercq was born at Remiremont in the duchy of Lorraine in 1576. Her family was a solid one, of good position, but little is known about her life until she was nearly seventeen. Alix was attractive and intelligent, what the French call “spirituelle.” About this time, she became a nun. When her family moved to Hymont, she met Peter Fourier, who became her spiritual director, and in 1597 she and three other women formed a new foundation under his direction. At her father's insistence, she went to a convent at Ormes, was unimpressed by its secular atmosphere, and in 1598 the wealthy Judith d'Apremont gave Alix and her group a house on her estate, which they used as their Motherhouse in the founding of a new congregation dedicated to the education of children. Despite opposition from Alix's father and others, and the lack of formal ecclesiastical approval, they established several new foundations.
   In 1616 they received two papal bulls formally approving the Augustinian Canonesses of the Congregation of Our Lady from Rome. Differences about what the bulls granted and internal strife caused Father Fourier to replace Alix as superioress of the Congregation, and the last years of her life were bitter, as even Father Fourier seemed to turn against her. She died in her convent at Nancy on January 9, and was beatified in 1947.

1622 Bd Alix Le Clercq, Virgin, Co-Foundress of The Augustinian Canonesses Regular of The Congregation of Our Lady
One of the outstanding achievements of the Counter-Reformation—like some of its others, long overdue—was the beginning of proper provision for the schooling and education of girls. In 1535 St Angela Merici had founded the Ursulines for this work; the teaching Religious of Notre Dame were begun by St Joan de Lestonnac in 1606; in 1609 Mary Ward opened her first school for poor children; and to these must be added the establishment by St Peter Fourier of the Augustinian Canonesses of the Congregation of Our Lady, an undertaking in which Alix Le Clercq came to be associated as co-foundress.
 She was born at Remiremont in the duchy of Lorraine in 1576. Her family was a solid one, of good position, but little is known about her life until she was nearly seventeen. By that time she was a tall, good-looking girl, fair in colouring, of a somewhat delicate constitution, attractive and intelligent: in a word Alix was, as Mgr Francis Gonne remarks, what the French call spirituelle. Another account, written by herself, tells us that she revelled in such pleasures as music and dancing, and being very popular was subjected to a good deal of flattery. The implication is that she “revelled” too much: perhaps she did; but it should be remembered that, when once people have become convinced that they have any faults at all, they are apt to exaggerate them. And there is good evidence, her own, that even at this time Alix Le Clercq was not devoid of “seriousness” “amid all the gaiety her heart was sad”, and gradually her harmless pleasures seemed to her to be no more than frivolity.
Then, when she was nineteen, she had the first of the striking dreams that became so marked a feature in her life. In this dream she was in church and approaching the altar, when beside it she saw our Lady, dressed in a strange religious habit, who beckoned her, saying, “Come, daughter, and I will welcome you”.  Soon after, the Le Clercq family moved to Hymont, and Alix first met St Peter Fourier, who was parish priest of Mattaincourt, near by. It was in the church of this village, at Mass on three Sundays running, that she seemed to hear the seductive music of a dance-drum, and then seemed to see its player, an evil spirit, followed by a crowd of young people, “full of sprightly merriment”. There and then her conversion to a different sort of life was complete “I resolved on the spot that I would not belong to such a company”.
   Alix straightway cast aside her fine clothes and wore a simple peasant dress; she hardly left her home; and, under the careful direction of Father Fourier, she set herself to discover—not without much spiritual suffering—what it was that God required of her.  Both her father and the priest proposed that she should go into a convent but she said “No” to this, for from another dream she had learned that it was in no existing order that her vocation lay.  She told St Peter Fourier that she was obsessed by the idea of a new, “active”, foundation.  He was very properly sceptical about this, but at length told her to see if she could find other girls of like mind—unlikely enough in a remote village of the Vosges. But sure enough Alix found them.
  And so at the midnight Mass of Christmas 1597 Alix Le Clercq, Ganthe André, and Isabel and Joan de Louvroir were allowed publicly to dedicate themselves wholly to God. Four weeks later it was made clear to St Peter Fourier that these neophytes were to found a community under his direction. But meanwhile they were the subjects of adverse criticism. “The unassuming behaviour of these girls was called singularity; their zeal, religiosity; their simple dress, hypocritical affectation; and their humble bearing, silliness.”  This gossip naturally upset Mr Le Clercq; but he lacked imagination, and could think of nothing better than to order his daughter to go as a boarder to a convent of Tertiaries of St Elizabeth at Ormes.  She obeyed; and found this relaxed convent to be something like what we should call a women’s residential club. But her father would not let her come home.
   A way out of the impasse was opened from an unexpected quarter.  Three miles from Mattaincourt, at the village of Poussay, there was an abbey of secular canonesses, aristocratic and wealthy ladies who led a form of the Conventual life mercifully no longer existing in the Church. One of these good ladies, Madame Judith d’Apremont, made up her mind to sponsor Alix Le Clercq and her three companions and to lodge them in a small house on her estate. Accordingly they took up their quarters there on the eve of Corpus Christi 1598; and after a retreat they unanimously and independently declared to Father Fourier that they believed themselves called to begin a new congregation, that for them this was what would be most pleasing to God. It was decided that their work should be education, “to teach children to read and write and sew, and especially to love and serve God”; that they should never give up this work; and that it should be done, whether for rich or poor, without charge, “as that is more pleasing to God”.
The life of the embryonic congregation was notable in these early days for a measure of physical austerity that was later to be found incompatible with the hard discipline of teaching the young. But the spectacle of such devotion at their very door inspired some of the younger canonesses of the abbey to ask to be transferred to the new foundation—they wanted to stop having “all the privileges of the Conventual life with none of its hardships”. Their lady abbess, Madame d’Apremont, was alarmed—many monasteries in France had learned nothing from the impact of the Reformation on monasticism in other lands—fearing that her own community might be broken up; and for some weeks there was a rather critical situation. But again Madame d’Apremont solved the difficulty, by providing another house, this time at Mattaincourt. It was to be the first proper convent of the new congregation.
   But as yet the sisters were not formally religious, and their anomalous position upset Mr Le Clercq, who again interfered with his daughter, telling her that she was to withdraw to the Poor Clare house at Verdun. St Peter Fourier told Alix she must obey, and in great anguish of spirit she got ready. But her father, moved as he said by some power beyond his understanding, withdrew his order and ceased to interfere.  There then occurred a determined attempt on the part of a Franciscan Recollect friar, Father Fleurant Boulengier, to “capture” the community for the Poor Clares. Peter Fourier’s belief in the divine acceptance of his foundation wavered he recommended, with a force only short of a direct command, that they should regularize their position by joining the Clares—Alix and her companions refused. “We have banded together”, they said, “to look after neglected children:  why should we be dragged away from this and sent to a convent that God does not want us to go to?”
   Father Fourier, in equal good faith, interpreted the will of God in the opposite sense. It is an old dilemma. Or was he just trying them? In any case, after months of uncertainty, he accepted the sisters’ decision, and so did Father Fleurant.
   In 1601 St Peter Fourier and Bd Alix made their second foundation, at Saint-Mihiel; Nancy, Pont-à-Mousson, Saint-Nicolas de Port, Verdun and Châlons followed, the last, in 1613, being the first outside Lorraine.  All this time there was no sign from Rome of official approval for the new congregation.  The novel request that day-pupils should be taken, and therefore admitted into the enclosure, roused hostility (“The Church is going to the dogs, sir”); and the delay in approbation lent an edge to wagging tongues and endangered the existence of the convents. Fourier sent Bd Alix and another sister to the Ursulines in Paris to learn more about monastic life and teaching methods and again they were invited to give up a separate existence.  This time Alix seriously considered if it were not the best thing to do.  Father (afterwards cardinal) de Bérulle settled it. “I don’t believe”, he declared to her bluntly, “that God is asking for this fusion. Dismiss it from your mind.”
   It was not till 1616 that in two bulls the Holy See signified its first approval of the Augustinian Canonesses of the Congregation of Our Lady.*{*Their style as “canonesses” was confirmed in 1628; it carried with it, of course, the obligation and privilege of reciting the Divine Office in choir.}  Subsequently the Bishop of Toul approved their constitutions; and St Peter Fourier then proceeded to clothe thirteen of them with the habit, designed in accordance with what Bd Alix had seen our Lady wearing in the dream recorded above; and then they all had to begin a twelve months’ novitiate, in spite of the fact that some of them had been leading a conventual life for twenty years. But all was not well. The papal bulls of approbation had not mentioned the congregation as a whole, but only its convent at Nancy. Now there was already a certain “feeling” between this house and the others, for Nancy was under the protection of Cardinal Charles of Lorraine, and the primate of Lorraine, Antony de Lénoncourt, had practically taken its direction out of Father Fourier’s hands into his own. The apparent partiality of the bulls aggravated this spirit of dissension, and a very unhappy state of affairs resulted.  In the upshot Bd Alix had to yield her rightful place as superioress in the congregation to Mother Ganthe André, “without whom”, in the words of Father Fourier, “our order would never have been established”, though she and Alix were far from being in agreement about its organization.
   That sort of trial heroic sanctity seems to take in its stride. But that was not all.  Bd Alix was subjected to personal attack and the venom of slanderous rumour.  At the same time she had to face spiritual dryness, temptations and a “dark night” of great severity.  And as, in the words of one of her nuns, “she entered into the sufferings of others so feelingly that she made them her own”, her burden was indeed heavy: she had plenty of opportunity to put into practice her own axiom— common to all saints, and mystics—“I value one act of humility more than a hundred ecstasies”.  St Peter Fourier himself provided further opportunities.   Bd Alix is now recognized as the co-foundress of the Augustinian Canonesses of Our Lady; but it was not so while she lived, and Father Fourier did not allow it to appear so. He consistently and openly “kept her in her place”.  It is possible that he was, in a sense, a little afraid of her, for in contrast with his own solid, cautious temperament, Alix Le Clercq must often have seemed to him alarmingly “imaginative”.
   In December 1621 she was allowed to resign the office of local superioress at Nancy, and she entered upon a few weeks of radiant peace, which was in fact a prelude to death a month later. She had been seriously ill for a long time, and now when it was known the doctors had given up hope, all Nancy was grieved, from the duke and duchess of Lorraine to the schoolgirls and the beggar-women.  St Peter Fourier hurried to Nancy, but he would not enter the Conventual enclosure till the bishop ordered him to do so.  Then he heard Alix’s confession and prepared her for the passage “from death to life”.  On the Epiphany she took a solemn farewell of her community, exhorting them to love and unity, and on January 9, after a searching agony, the end came. Bd Alix was not quite forty-six.
  High and low acclaimed her as a saint, and steps were taken to collect evidence for the prosecution of her cause. But nothing was done more definitely, war pushed it out of sight, and it was not till 1947 that Alix Le Clercq was beatified.  Her body was buried in the crypt under the convent chapel at Nancy.  During the Revolution this convent was sacked; it is said that Bd Alix’s body was hastily buried in the garden for safety, but all efforts to find it have failed.  That would have pleased her humility, she whose deeds of love and spiritual insights and visions were so far as possible concealed.  She was completely at ease only when she could be humble and obedient, teaching the ABC and simple addition to half-a-dozen little children at Poussay or Mattaincourt, for instance.  But in the long disagreements and uncertainties about the organization of the congregation, in such matters she was mistress of herself and of the policies she believed right; and she was always an excellent superior.  But a Protestant historian, Professor Pfister, has acutely remarked that, “When she was appointed to direct the Nancy house, she had only one ambition and that was again to be a simple sister, teaching their letters to the four and five-year-olds in the bottom class”.  The last word about Bd Alix Le Clercq is with Mother Angélique Milly—“she was the child of deep silence”.
In 1666 the Nancy convent published what purported to be a life of Alix le Clercq but was in fact an extremely valuable collection of documents bearing on that life.  It was due to a copy of this book coming into the hands of the young Count Gandelet that the Bishop of Saint-Die began the cause of her beatification in 1885. The first biography proper to be published appeared at Nancy in 1773 (one of 1766 remains in manuscript), and then not another till 1858, after which there were several. La Mère Alix Le Clercq (1935), by Canon Edmond Renard, is the standard modern work, full, critical and well written.  In English there is a short but very good biography by Margaret St L. West (1947).  Reference can also be made to the standard lives of St Peter Fourier by Father Bedel (1645), Dom Vuillemin (1897), and Father Rogie, of which the last is the best.  The writer of the preface to the English life of Bd Alix speaks of the excellent methods used in the schools conducted by her congregation.  Fourier himself used to instruct his canonesses in pedagogy, and brief reference to some of his enlightened educational ideas is made in the notice accorded to him herein on December 9. The feast of Bd Alix is now kept on October 22.
BEATA ALIX LE CLERCQ,(*)  Virgen Fundadora (1622 P.C.)
    Una de las grandes obras de la contra reforma fue haber comenzado a preocuparse por la educación de las niñas. En 1535, Santa Ángela de Merici había fundado la congregación de las Ursulinas con este fin. Santa Juana de Lestonnac fundó, en 1606, la congregación de las Religiosas de Nuestra Señora. A su vez, San Pedro Fourier fundó a las Canonesas Regulares de San Agustín de la congregación de Nuestra Señora, empresa en la cual Alix Le Clrecq cooperó como cofundadora.
   Alix nació en Remiremont, ducado de Lorena, en 1576. Su familia ocupaba una posición destacada; pero es poco lo que sabemos de la vida de Alix hasta los diecisiete años. A esa edad era una joven alta y hermosa, rubia, de constitución delicada, atractiva e inteligente; en una palabra, como lo hace notar Mons. Francis Gonne, Alix era lo que los franceses llaman "spirituelle". Otro relato, escrito por ella misma, nos informa que se distinguía en la música y la danza, que era muy popular y que tenía muchos admiradores. Alix deja entender que se envanecía de todo esto, lo que es probable. En todo caso, no hay que olvidar que los santos tienden a exagerar sus defectos. Por otra parte, el relato de Alix muestra que la joven no carecía de seriedad: "En medio de todo esto, mi corazón estaba triste". Poco a poco, la frivolidad de su vida se le hizo insoportable.
   A los diecinueve años tuvo el primero de los sueños que habían de jalonar su vida. Se vio en una iglesia, cerca del altar; a su lado se hallaba Nuestra Señora, vestida con un hábito religioso desconocido, hablándole: "Ven, hija mía, que yo misma voy a darte la bienvenida", le decía. Poco después, la familia Le Clercq fue a habitar a Hymont. Ahí encontró Alix a San Pedro Fourier, que era vicario de una parroquia de Mattaincourt, en las cercanías. Un día que asistía a la misa en esa parroquia, Alix oyó un ruido de tambor y vio al demonio que hacía bailar a los jóvenes "ebrios de alegría". En ese instante se operó la conversión de Alix, quien nos dice: "Ahí mismo resolví no mezclarme con semejante compañía".
   Alix cambió sus finos vestidos por el sayal de las campesinas, y apenas salía de su casa. Bajo la prudente dirección de San Pedro Fourier, se dedicó a buscar la voluntad de Dios hacia ella, lo cual le produjo grandes sufrimientos espirituales. Tanto su padre como San Pedro Fourier, le aconsejaron que entrara a un convento. Pero ella se negó, pues un sueño le había revelado que no existía ninguna forma de vida religiosa adaptada a su vocación. Alix confió a San Pedro Fourier que estaba obsesionada por la idea de fundar una congregación activa. El santo se mostró escéptico; sin embargo, le aconsejó que buscara a otras jóvenes que compartieran su idea, cosa muy difícil en un apartado pueblecito de los Vosgos. Alix realizó su cometido con tanto tino, que logró encontrar compañeras.
   En la Misa de Navidad de 1597, Alix Le Clercq, Ganthe André, Isabel y Juana de Louvroir se consagraron públicamente a Dios. Cuatro semanas más tarde, San Pedro Fourier quedó convencido de que estaban llamadas a fundar una comunidad bajo su dirección. Naturalmente, las críticas no escasearon. "Las gentes tachaban de singularidad la desacostumbrada conducta de las jóvenes, no veían más que afectación en su manera de vestirse, y consideraban como una tontería su humildad". El padre de Alix se sintió herido por estas críticas, y la única solución que pudo encontrar fue la de enviar a su hija como pensionaria al convento de las terciarias de Santa Isabel, en Ormes. Alix obedeció, aunque aquel relajado convento cuadraba mal con sus aspiraciones, y el señor Le Clercq no le permitió volver a casa.
   Una solución inesperada se ofreció a Alix. En Poussay, a cuatro kilómetros de Mattaincourt, había una abadía de canonesas seculares. Se trataba de una comunidad de damas ricas y aristocráticas que llevaban una vida conventual que felizmente ha desaparecido. Una de esas buenas señoras, Judith d'Apremont, decidió proteger a Alix y a sus tres compañeras dándoles albergue en una casita de sus posesiones. Las jóvenes se instalaron ahí la víspera del Corpus Christi de 1598. Al terminar un retiro, declararon unánimemente a San Pedro Fourier que se sentían llamadas a fundar una nueva congregación, ya que tal era la voluntad de Dios para ellas. El fin de la nueva congregación era "enseñar a las niñas a leer, a escribir y a coser, pero sobre todo a amar y servir a Dios". A esta santa ocupación debían consagrarse, sin distinguir entre pobres y ricos, y sin cobrar ni un céntimo, "porque esto agrada más a Dios".
   La vida de las religiosas se distinguió al principio, por la severidad de la penitencia; pero el tiempo les hizo comprender que esto era incompatible con las grandes exigencias de la enseñanza de la juventud. El espectáculo de su devoción inspiró en algunas canonesas de la abadía el deseo de ingresar en la nueva fundación, pues estaban cansadas de gozar de "todos los privilegios de la vida conventual, sin experimentar su rudeza". La abadesa, madame d'Amoncourt, que no aceptaba las grandes reformas operadas en los monasterios de la época, temió que su comunidad se disolviera. La situación fue muy crítica durante varias semanas. Judith d'Apremont resolvió esta crisis, ofreciendo a las nuevas religiosas otra casa en Mattaincourt. Tal fue el primer convento propiamente dicho de la nueva congregación.
   Sin embargo, no se trataba todavía de una comunidad religiosa en el sentido estricto del término, lo cual inquietó al padre de Alix, quien le ordenó retirarse a Verdún. San Pedro Fourier declaró a la joven que estaba obligada a obedecer. Felizmente el señor Le Clercq, movido por el Espíritu Santo en forma irresistible, retiró la orden que había dado. Poco después, un franciscano recoleto, el P. Fleurant Boulengier, intentó asociar la nueva comunidad a las clarisas. San Pedro Fourier, cuya confianza en la nueva fundación no era todavía muy grande, recomendó insistentemente a Alix y sus compañeras que se asociaran con las clarisas, pero ellas se negaron diciendo: "Nos hemos reunido en comunidad para consagrarnos a la educación de las niñas, de suerte que no podemos apartamos de nuestra vocación y adoptar una forma de vida a la que Dios no nos ha llamado".
   San Pedro Fourier, por su parte, interpretaba en otra forma la voluntad de Dios, o fingía hacerlo así para probarlas. En todo caso, tras algunos meses de vacilaciones, aceptó finalmente la decisión.   En 1601, San Pedro Fourier y la Beata Alix fundaron una segunda casa en Mihiel, a la que siguieron las de Nancy, Pont-à-Mousson, Saint-Nicolas du Port, Verdún y Chalons. Esta última, establecida en 1613, fue la primera fundación fuera de Lorena. Hasta ese momento, Roma no había aprobado todavía la nueva congregación. La idea de recibir a las niñas en el interior de la clausura para impartirles instrucción, provocaba la hostilidad general. Por otra parte, la reticencia de Roma parecía dar la razón a quienes criticaban la novedad, y ponía en peligro la fundación. San Pedro Fourier envió a Alix y a una de sus compañeras al convento de las Ursulinas de París para que se documentaran sobre la vida monástica y los métodos de enseñanza. Las Ursulinas les propusieron que se unieran con ellas. Esta vez Alix reflexionó seriamente sobre la proposición, pero el P. Bérulle, que más tarde sería cardenal, resolvió sus dudas: "No creo -le dijo abiertamente- que Dios quiera esta fusión, de modo que lo mejor que puede hacer es olvidar el asunto".
   En 1616, dos bulas de la Santa Sede concedieron por fin la deseada aprobación. A raíz de ello, el obispo de Toul aprobó las constituciones. Trece religiosas llevaron por primera vez el hábito que vestía la Santísima Virgen en la visión de la Beata Alix, y comenzaron el año de noviciado, no obstante que algunas de ellas llevaban ya veinte años en el convento. Pero no todo iba viento en popa. Las bulas papales de aprobación, sólo mencionaban el convento de Nancy. Ahora bien, entre dicho convento y los otros, existía una especie de emulación, porque el de Nancy se hallaba bajo la protección del cardenal Carlos de Lorena, y el primado de Lorena, Antonio de Lénoncourt, había prácticamente asumido la dirección. La aparente parcialidad de las bulas no hizo sino agravar la disensión, lo cual produjo una desagradable crisis. El resultado fue que la Beata Alix tuvo que renunciar a su cargo de superiora de la congregación, en favor de la madre Ganthe André, "sin la cual -explica San Pedro Fourier- nuestra congregación no hubiera podido fundarse", a pesar de que la madre André y Alix no estuvieran de acuerdo sobre la organización.
   Como si no bastara esta prueba de santidad heroica, la beata se vio sujeta a ataques personales por parte de las malas lenguas. Al mismo tiempo, atravesaba una crisis de sequedad espiritual, tentaciones y "noche oscura del alma". Por otra parte, como lo atestiguaron sus hijas, "Alix tomaba los sufrimientos ajenos como si fueran propios", de modo que su situación era muy dificil. En esa época tuvo la ocasión de practicar su propia máxima, común a todos los santos y místicos: "Un acto de humildad vale más que cien éxtasis". El mismo San Pedro Foumier le proporcionó otras oportunidades de practicar la virtud.
   Actualmente se reconoce a la beata el título de cofundadora de las Canonesas de Nuestra Señora. No así durante su vida, y San Pedro Foumier era el primero en negarle ese título "para mantenerla en su lugar". Es probable que el santo haya temido por ella, puesto que Alix debía parecerle muy imaginativa en comparación con su temperamento sólido y cauteloso.
   En 1621, Alix obtuvo permiso de renunciar al cargo de superiora local de Nancy, y entró en un corto período de extraordinaria paz, que fue el preludio de su muerte. Estaba enferma desde tiempo atrás. Los médicos la de clararon incurable, diagnóstico que desconsoló a todo Nancy, desde el duque y la duquesa de Lorena hasta las colegialas y los mendigos. San Pedro Fournier acudió a toda prisa a Nancy, pero no pudo penetrar en la clausura, hasta que el obispo le autorizó a ello. La oyó en confesión y la preparó para el paso "de la muerte a la vida". La beata se despidió solemnemente de la comunidad el día de la Epifanía, exhortando a sus religiosas al amor y la unión. El fin llegó el 9 de enero, después de una larga agonía. La beata no había cumplido aún los cuarenta y seis años.
   Todos la aclamaron como santa, e inmediatamente empezaron a recogerse testimonios para introducir su causa; pero la guerra impidió llevar adelante el proceso, y Alix Le Clerq no fue beatificada sino hasta 1947. El convento de Nancy fue saqueado durante la Revolución, y se dice que el cuerpo de Alix fue quemado a toda prisa para evitar una profanación. Lo cierto es que, todos los esfuerzos para recuperarlo han resultado infructuosos. Su humildad debe complacerse en ello en el cielo, ya que en la tierra se esforzó tanto por ocultar sus obras de caridad y sus visiones. Sólo en la humildad y obediencia encontra ba reposo, enseñando el abecedario y las operaciones elementales de aritmética a las niñas de Nancy. Esto no obstante, en las largas dificultades e incertidum bres que precedieron a la organización de la congregación, la beata demostró gran firmeza de resolución y fue siempre una excelente superiora. Sin embargo, como lo hace notar el historiador protestante Pfister, "cuando la nombraron supe riora de Nancy, sólo tenía una ambición: la de entregarse como la más humilde de las hermanas a la enseñanza de las primeras letras en las clases más bajas". La madre Angélica Milly ha trazado el mejor retrato de Alix, al decimos: "era un alma silenciosa".
   En 1666, el convento de Nancy publicó una vida de Alix Le Clercq, que es en realidad una colección de valiosos documentos sobre la beata. El obispo de Saint-Dié introdujo, en 1885, la causa de beatificación, basándose en un ejemplar de esa biografía, que había caído en manos del conde Gandélet. La primera biografía propiamente dicha fue publicada en Nancy, en 1773; existe el manuscrito de otra, escrita en 1766; en 1858 vio la luz otra biogra fía, y a partir de entonces se han multiplicado los libros sobre la beata. La obra del ca nónigo Edmond Renard, La Mere Alix Le Clercq (1935), es la mejor biografía moderna, tanto desde el punto de vista de crítica, como de estilo. Hay que mencionar también las vidas de San Pedro Fournier, escritas por Bedel (1645), Dom Vuillemin (1897), y el P. Rogie; ésta última es la mejor. El autor del prefacio de la biografía inglesa de la Beata Alix, habla de los excelentes métodos de educación empleados por las canonesas. San Pedro Fournier enseñaba la pedagogía a sus religiosas; en el artículo a él consagrado en este libro (9 de diciembre) se hace mención dc sus ideas pedagógicas. La fiesta de la Beata Alix se celebra el 22 de octubre.


THE PSALTER OF THE BLESSED VIRGIN MARY PSALM 103

Why have our enemies raged and our adversaries devised vain things?

May thy right hand protect us, O Mother of God:
as a line of battle terrible in aspect, confounding and destroying them.

Come ye to her, all who labor and are in trouble: and she will give refreshment to your souls.

Draw nigh to her in your temptations: and the serenity of her countenance will bring you peace and confidence.

Bless her with your whole heart: for the earth is full of her mercy.

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
  Links to Related MarianWebsites  Angels and Archangels  Saints Visions of Heaven and Hell
Widowed Saints  html
Doctors_of_the_Church   Acts_Of_The_Apostles  Roman Catholic Popes  Purgatory  Uniates  Chalcedon
Mary the Mother of Jesus Miracles_BC  Lay Saints  Miraculous_Icons  Miraculous_Medal_Novena Patron Saints
Miracles by Century 100   200   300   400   500   600   700    800   900   1000    1100   1200   1300   1400  1500  1600  1700  1800  1900 2000
Miracles 100   200   300   400   500   600   700    800   900   1000  
 1100   1200   1300   1400  1500  1600  1700  1800   1900 Lay Saints

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]
To Save A Life is Earthly; Saving A Soul is Eternal Donation by mail, please send check or money order to:
Eternal Word Television Network 5817 Old Leeds Rd. Irondale, AL 35210  USA
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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, 103 2023