Friday Saints of this Day September  01  Kaléndis Septémbris  
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.
September is the month of Our Lady of Sorrows since 1857
2023
22,013 Lives Saved Since 2007

 Pope Francis calls on everyone to be “protectors of creation, protectors of God’s plan inscribed in nature, protectors of one another and of the environment.” Pope Francis

     CAUSES OF SAINTS

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

Acts of the Apostles

Nine First Fridays Devotion to the Sacred Heart From the writings of St. Margaret Mary Alacoque

How do I start the Five First Saturdays?

Mary Mother of GOD 15 Promises of the Virgin Mary to those who recite the Rosary  .


       40 days for Life Campaign saves lives Shawn Carney Campaign Director www.40daysforlife.com , 
Please help save the unborn they are the future for the world
It is a great poverty that a child must die so that you may live as you wish -- Mother Teresa
Saving babies, healing moms and dads, 'The Gospel of Life

Give as if every pasture in the mountains of Ireland belonged to you. -- Saint Aidan
 
“It Is a Mortal Sin When Children Don't Visit Their Elderly Parents.”

True charity consists in putting up with all one's neighbor's faults,
never being surprised by his weakness, and being inspired by the least of his virtues. -- St Therese of Lisieux

  It Makes No Sense Not To Believe In GOD 
Every Christian must be a living book wherein one can read the teaching of the gospel

Pope Francis  PRAYER INTENTIONS FOR September  2022

The Abolition Of The Death Penalty
We pray that the death penalty, which attacks the dignity of the human person,
may be legally abolished in every country.

Before introduction of the Julian calendar, Rome began New Year September 1.
According to Holy Tradition, Christ entered the synagogue on September 1 to announce His mission to mankind (Luke 4:16-22). Quoting Isaiah 61:1-2), the Savior proclaimed, "The spirit of the Lord is upon me; because He has anointed me to preach the gospel to the poor; He has sent me to proclaim release to captives, and recovering of sight to the blind, to set at liberty those who are oppressed, to proclaim the acceptable year of the Lord…"
This scene is depicted in a Vatican manuscript (Vatican, Biblioteca. Cod. Gr. 1613, p.1).
St. Joshua and St. Gideon Israelites, Old Testament patriarch and judge
St. Anna the Prophetess whose sanctity is revealed in the Gospel.
St. Sixtus, disciple of the blessed apostle Peter, who consecrated him first bishop at Rheims in France.  He received the crown of martyrdom under Nero
       St. Priscus, martyr, who was formerly one of the disciples of Christ.
 118 St. Terentian Bishop of Todi, in Umbria Italy; martyr
380 Holy Martyr Aithalas the Deacon death by stoning for confessing Christ by Persian emperor Sapor II
 490 St. Victorious Bishop of Le Mans a disciple of St. Martin of Tours originally
 520 St. Constantius Bishop of Aquino; renowned for the gift of prophecy. many virtues;
543-615 'St Columbanus Was Privileged Channel of God’s Grace'
670? ST FIACRE sometimes miraculously restored to health those that were sick.
700 ST DRITHELM visions of afterlife when separated from his body
1367 BD JOAN SODERINI, VIRGIN her tomb at once became a place of pilgrimage.
1490 St. Beatrice da Silva Meneses foundress
1588 BD HUGH MORE, MARTYR reconciled with the Church by Father Thomas Stephenson, s.j.
1855 Bl. Michael Ghebre Vincentian martyr of Ethiopia



St. Joshua and St. Gideon; Israelites, Old Testament patriarch and judge,
In Palæstína sanctórum Jósue et Gedeónis.    In Palestine, the Saints Joshua and Gideon.
Saint Joshua (Jesus), the son of Navi, was leader of the Israelites after the death of the Prophet Moses. He was born in Egypt and succeeded Moses when he was eighty-five. He ruled the Israelites for twenty-five years.

Joshua conquered the Promised Land, and led the Hebrew nation into it. The Lord worked a great miracle through Joshua. He stopped the Jordan from flowing, allowing the Israelites to cross over on foot as if on dry land (Joshua 3).
St Michael, the Leader of the Heavenly Hosts, appeared to Joshua (Joshua 5:13-15).
The walls of Jericho fell down by themselves after the Ark of the Covenant was carried around the city for seven days (Joshua 6:20). Finally, during a battle with the enemy, Joshua, by God's will, halted the motion of the sun (Joshua 10:13) and prolonged the day until victory was won.

After the end of the war, Joshua divided the Promised Land among the Twelve Tribes of Israel. He died at 110 years of age, commanding the nation to preserve the Law of Moses. All these events are recounted in the Book of Joshua, the sixth book of the Old Testament.
St. Anna the Prophetess whose sanctity is revealed in the Gospel.
Hierosólymis beátæ Annæ Prophetíssæ, cujus sanctitátem sermo Evangélicus prodit.
    At Jerusalem, blessed Anna, prophetess, whose sanctity is revealed in the Gospel.
A widow and seeress, described in St. Luke's Gospel.
Simeon_and_Anna in the temple.
Rhemis, in Gállia, sancti Xysti, qui fuit primus ejúsdem civitátis Epíscopus.
    St. Sixtus, disciple of the blessed apostle Peter, who consecrated him the first bishop at Rheims in France.  He received the crown of martyrdom under Nero.
Cápuæ, via Aquária, sancti Prisci Mártyris, qui fuit unus de antíquis Christi discípulis.
    At Capua, on the Via Aquaria, St. Priscus, martyr, who was formerly one of the disciples of Christ.
118 St. Terentian Bishop of Todi, in Umbria, Italy and martyr.
Tudérti, in Umbria, sancti Terentiáni, Epíscopi et Mártyris; qui, sub Hadriáno Imperatóre, Lætiáni Procónsulis jussu, equúleo et scorpiónibus cruciátus est, ac demum, abscíssa lingua, cápitis damnátus martyrium complévit.
    At Todi in Umbria, St. Terentian, bishop and martyr.  Under Emperor Hadrian, by order of the proconsul Laetian, he was racked, scourged with whips set with metal, and finally having had his tongue cut out, he ended his martyrdom by undergoing capital punishment.
While serving as bishop of Todi, in Umbria, Italy, he was arrested during the persecutions under Emperor Hadrian. He was tortured by having his tongue cut out and then being beheaded.
3rd v. St. Verena Hermitess Originally from Egypt; spent her remaining days as a hermite in a cave near Zurich
Ad Aquas Duras, in Constantiénsi Germániæ território, sanctæ Verénæ Vírginis.
    In Baden, in the province of Constance, St. Verena, virgin.
Supposedly a relative of St. Victor the Theban Legion. She went to Rhaetia (modern Switzerland) to find him. She settled there at a site called Solothurn, but spent her remaining days as a hermite in a cave near Zurich.
Sentiáni, in fínibus Apúliæ, pássio sanctórum Donáti et altérius Felícis; qui, sanctórum Bonifátii et Theclæ fílii, a Valeriáno Júdice, sub Maximiáno Imperatóre, jussi sunt, post vária torménta, cápite præcídi hodiérna die, in qua et festívitas aliórum ex duódecim frátribus, quorum natális respectívis diébus ágitur, institúta est celebrári.  Ipsórum vero duódecim fratrum córpora Benevéntum póstea transláta sunt, ibíque honorífice asserváta.
    At Sentiano, in the district of Apulia, the passion of Saints Donatus and a second Felix who were the sons of Saints Boniface and Thecla.  After they had endured various torments under the judge Valerian in the reign of Emperor Maximian, they were condemned to be beheaded on this day.  Today also is kept the festival of the others of the Twelve Holy Brethren, whose birthdays are noted in their proper place.  The bodies of these Twelve Holy Brethren were later translated to Benevento where they are honourably enshrined.
332 St. Ammon a deacon in Thrace, now in the southern Balkans; Martyr who died with 40 young women converts
Heracléæ, in Thrácia, sancti Ammónis Diáconi, et sanctárum quadragínta Vírginum, quas ille erudívit in fide, et, sub Licínio tyránno, ad martyrii glóriam secum perdúxit.
    At Heraclea, under the tyrant Licinius, St. Ammon, deacon, and forty holy virgins whom he instructed in the faith and led with him to the glory of martyrdom.

Saint Ammoun the Deacon was from Adrianopolis in Macedonia, and instructed forty holy virgins in the Christian Faith. They were captured by Baudos the governor, and were tortured because they would not offer sacrifice to idols.

The holy martyrs endured many cruel torments, which were intended to force them to renounce Christ and worship idols. Later, they were sent to Heraklea in Thrace to appear before the tyrant Licinius. The valiant martyrs remained unshakeable, however.

St Ammoun and eight of the virgins were beheaded, ten virgins were burned, six of them died after heated metal balls were put into their mouths, six were stabbed with knives, and the rest were struck in the mouth and stabbed in the heart with swords.

Ammon was a deacon in Thrace, now in the southern Balkans. Under the persecutions of Emperor Licinius, he and forty of his converts died. St. Ammon was singled out and slain by having a red hot poker placed on his head.

The 40 Holy Virgins and Saint Ammoun the Deacon, were from Adrianopolis in Macedonia. Deacon Ammoun was their guide in Christian Faith. They were captured by Baudos the governor, and were tortured because they would not offer sacrifice to idols.

The holy martyrs endured many cruel torments, which were intended to force them to renounce Christ and worship idols. Later, they were sent to Heraklea in Thrace to appear before the tyrant Licinius. The valiant martyrs remained unshakeable, however.

St Ammoun and eight of the virgins were beheaded, ten virgins were burned, six of them died after heated metal balls were put into their mouths, six were stabbed with knives, the rest were struck in the mouth and stabbed in the heart with swords.
380 The Holy Martyr Aithalas the Deacon, by order of the Persian emperor Sapor II, was put to death by stoning for confessing Christ.
Cápuæ sancti Prisci Epíscopi, qui unus fuit ex illis Sacerdótibus, qui, in persecutióne Wandalórum, ob fidem cathólicam várie afflícti et vetústæ navi impósiti, ex Africa ad Campániæ líttora pervenérunt, et Christiánam religiónem, in iis locis dispérsi diversísque Ecclésiis præfécti, mirífice propagárunt.  Ipsíus autem fuérunt sócii Castrénsis, cujus dies natális tértio Idus Februárii recólitur, Támmarus, Rósius, Heráclius, Secundínus, Adjútor, Marcus, Augústus, Elpídius, Cánion et Vindónius.
    5th v. St. Priscus, bishop.  He was one of those priests At Capua, who were subjected to various trials for the Catholic faith during the persecution of the Vandals.  Being put in an old ship on the coast of Africa, they reached the shores of Campania, and separating, they were placed at the head of various churches, and thus greatly extended the Christian religion.  The companions of Priscus were Castrensis, whose birthday is mentioned on the 11th of February, Tammarius, Rosius, Heraclius, Secundinus, Adjutor, Mark, Augustus, Elpidius, Canion, and Vindonius.
6th v. St. Agia Widow also called Aja and Aye
She is reported as being the sainted mother of St. Lupus of Sens.
St. Nivard Archbishop of Reims brother in law of the Frankish king Childeric II of Austrasia. He restored Hautvilliers Abbey and enshrined there.
5th v. Saint Martha and her husband Sisotion were the parents of St Simeon the Stylite.
She lived in Cilicia of Asia Minor during the fourth and fifth centuries, and came from a poor family. She and her husband Sisotion were the parents of St Simeon the Stylite.

At the age of eighteen, Simeon received the monastic tonsure without his parents' knowledge. Many years later, Martha came to the saint's pillar in order to see him. Simeon sent word to her not to come, for if they were worthy, they would see each other in the life to come. Martha insisted on seeing him, and he had someone tell her to wait for a while in silence. St Martha agreed to this, and waited at the foot of the hill where her son's pillar stood. There she departed to the Lord.

When he heard that his mother had died, St Simeon ordered that her body be brought to the foot of his pillar. He prayed over his mother's body for some time shedding many tears, and witnesses said that a smile appeared on St Martha's face.
459 Saint Simeon the Stylite received monastic tonsure devoted himself to feats of strictest abstinence, unceasing prayer; 80 years in arduous monastic feats, 47 years upon the pillar
Born in the Cappadocian village of Sisan of Christian parents, Sisotian and Martha. At thirteen he began to tend his father's flock of sheep, devoting himself attentively. and with love to this, his first obedience.

Once, after he heard the Beatitudes in church, he was struck by their profundity. Not trusting to his own immature judgment, he turned therefore with his questions to an experienced Elder. The Elder readily explained to the boy the meaning of what he had heard. The seed fell on good soil, and it strengthened his resolve to serve God.

When Simeon was eighteen, he received monastic tonsure and devoted himself to feats of the strictest abstinence and unceasing prayer. His zeal, beyond the strength of the other monastic brethren, so alarmed the igumen that he told Simeon that to either moderate his ascetic deeds or leave the monastery.

St Simeon then withdrew from the monastery and lived in an empty well in the nearby mountains, where he was able to carry out his austere struggles unhindered. After some time, angels appeared in a dream to the igumen, who commanded him to bring back Simeon to the monastery.

The monk, however, did not long remain at the monastery. After a short while he settled into a stony cave, situated not far from the village of Galanissa, and he dwelt there for three years, all the while perfecting himself in monastic feats. Once, he decided to spent the entire forty days of Great Lent without food or drink. With the help of God, the monk endured this strict fast. From that time he abstained from food completely during the entire period of the Great Lent, even from bread and water. For twenty days he prayed while standing, and for twenty days while sitting, so as not to permit the corporeal powers to relax.

A whole crowd of people began to throng to the place of his efforts, wanting to receive healing from sickness and to hear a word of Christian edification. Shunning worldly glory and striving again to find his lost solitude, the monk chose a previously unknown mode of asceticism. He went up a pillar six to eight feet high, and settled upon it in a little cell, devoting himself to intense prayer and fasting.

Reports of St Simeon reached the highest church hierarchy and the imperial court. Patriarch Domninos II (441-448) of Antioch visited the monk, celebrated Divine Liturgy on the pillar and communed the ascetic with the Holy Mysteries.

Elders living in the desert heard about St Simeon, who had chosen a new and strange form of ascetic striving. Wanting to test the new ascetic and determine whether his extreme ascetic feats were pleasing to God, they sent messengers to him, who in the name of these desert fathers were to bid St Simeon to come down from the pillar.

In the case of disobedience they were to forcibly drag him to the ground. But if he was willing to submit, they were to leave him on his pillar. St Simeon displayed complete obedience and deep Christian humility. The monks told him to stay where he was, asking God to be his helper.

St Simeon endured many temptations, and he invariably gained the victory over them. He relied not on his own weak powers, but on the Lord Himself, Who always came to help him. The monk gradually increased the height of the pillar on which he stood. His final pillar was 80 feet in height. Around him a double wall was raised, which hindered the unruly crowd of people from coming too close and disturbing his prayerful concentration.

Women, in general, were not permitted beyond the wall. The saint did not make an exception even for his own mother, who after long and unsuccessful searches finally succeeded in finding her lost son. He would not see her, saying, "If we are worthy, we shall see one another in the life to come." St Martha submitted to this, remaining at the foot of the pillar in silence and prayer, where she finally died. St Simeon asked that her coffin be brought to him. He reverently bid farewell to his dead mother, and a joyful smile appeared on her face.

St Simeon spent 80 years in arduous monastic feats, 47 years of which he stood upon the pillar. God granted him to accomplish in such unusual conditions an indeed apostolic service. Many pagans accepted Baptism, struck by the moral staunchness and bodily strength which the Lord bestowed upon His servant.

The first one to learn of the death of the saint was his close disciple Anthony. Concerned that his teacher had not appeared to the people for three days, he went up on the pillar and found the dead body stooped over at prayer. Patriarch Martyrius of Antioch performed the funeral before a huge throng of clergy and people. They buried him near his pillar. At the place of his ascetic deeds, Anthony established a monastery, upon which rested the special blessing of St Simeon.
We pray to St Simeon for the return to the Church of those who have forsaken Her, or have been separated from Her.
490 St. Victorious Bishop of Le Mans a disciple of St. Martin of Tours originally.
Apud Cenómanos, in Gállia, sancti Victórii Epíscopi.    At Le Mans in France, St. Victorinus, bishop.
France, from circa 435. He was a disciple of St. Martin of Tours originally.
520 St. Constantius Bishop of Aquino; renowned for the gift of prophecy. many virtues;  mentioned by Pope St. Gregory the Great in his Dialogues.
Apud Aquínum sancti Constántii Epíscopi, prophetíæ dono multísque virtútibus clari.
    At Aquino, St. Constantius, a bishop renowned for the gift of prophecy and many virtues.
In Italy, mentioned by Pope St. Gregory the Great in his Dialogues.
543-615 'St Columbanus Was Privileged Channel of God’s Grace'
Cardinal Parolin Sends Papal Letter for 1400th Anniversary of Irish Missionary's Death
By Deborah Castellano Lubov Vatican City, August 31, 2015 (ZENIT.org)

“Saint Columbanus, who according to Benedict XVI we can truly consider one of the ‘Fathers of Europe,’ was convinced that there can be fraternity in the heart of Europe between people only if a civilization exists that is open to God.”

This statement was made by Pope Francis in a letter that Vatican Secretary of State, Cardinal Pietro Parolin, sent on Francis' behalf for the 18th International Meeting of the Columbanus Community, on the 1400th anniversary of the death of the saint. It was sent to Bishop Gianni Ambrosio of Piacenza-Bobbio, Italy.

Born in 543, Columbanus was a well-educated, Irish missionary who became a celebrated monk and founded several monasteries known for their strictness throughout Europe.  He left writings and a monastic Rule which emphasized obedience, silence, poverty, humility, and chastity. Recalling that Saint Columbanus died in Bobbio on Nov. 23, 615, the Holy Father sent his best wishes and greetings to the bishop, diocese, and all those participating in the meeting.

"Irish by family and formation, Columbanus always cherished the European idea of his ecclesial commitment," the papal note began, referring to a letter the missionary had written to Pope Gregory the Great in 600 AD, in which he made direct reference to the task of all Christians to collaborate so that the different peoples of the continent would live in peace and unity."

After thirty years in the monastery, the cardinal recalled, Columbanus "carried out the ascetic ideal typical" of the Irish communities, that of the perenigratio pro Christo.

The missionary, the Pontiff's letter stated, "became a pilgrim in Continental Europe, with the intention to have the light of the Gospel rediscovered in some European regions then de-Christianized after the immigration of peoples of the North East."

"Saint Columbanus was a privileged channel of God’s grace, attracting crowds of pilgrims and penitents, and receiving in the many new Monasteries very many youths, who embraced his Regula monachorum. Convinced, as he was, that grace is the specific help that providence gives to every human creature that receives the love of God in his existence, he was the intrepid diffuser of Confession, Sacrament of a personal nature, to be repeated in everyone’s life, as irreplaceable means for a serious path of conversion."

The nations which the now-saint evangelized and attracted many to Christ, he underscored, were many. Columbanus' monasteries, he also added, became "beacons of spiritual, intellectual and social radiation," such as Bangor in Ireland, Annegrey and Luxeuil in France, Sankt Gallen in Switzerland, the Bregen region in Germany, and Bobbio.

Cardinal Parolin reminded those gathered that Pope Francis expresses his earnest appreciation of the many pastoral and cultural initiatives, invokes the heavenly intercession of Saint Columbanus for the journey of the whole ecclesial community of which he is patron and for the peoples of Europe,  and imparts a heartfelt Apostolic Blessing.
545 St. Regulus Martyr Originally from Africa  martyred by the Ostrogoths under their Arian king Totila.
Populónii, in Túscia, sancti Réguli Mártyris, qui ex Africa illuc venit, ibíque, sub Tótila, martyrium consummávit.
    At Piombino in Tuscany, St. Regulus, martyr, who went thither from Africa, and consummated his martyrdom under Totila.
forced to depart his native land during the persecutions of orthodox Christians by the Arian Vandals. He lived in the region of Tuscany, Italy, but was eventually martyred by the Ostrogoths under their Arian king Totila.
623 St. Lupus of Sens Bishop of Sens France; while he stood at the holy altar in the presence of the clergy, a gem fell from heaven into the consecrated chalice which he was using.
Apud Sénonas beáti Lupi, Epíscopi et Confessóris; de quo refértur quod quadam die, præsénte Clero, dum sacris altáribus adstáret, lapsa est cælitus gemma in ejus cálicem sanctum.
    At Sens, St. Lupus, bishop and confessor, of whom it is related that on a certain day, while he stood at the holy altar in the presence of the clergy, a gem fell from heaven into the consecrated chalice which he was using.
Succeeding St. Anthony in that see in 609. Lupus was slandered by a courtier, Farulf, and by an abbot, Medegislus, and was exiled. The Merovingian king Clotaire II realized that Lupus was the victim of slander. The people of the region also knew, and a mob killed Abbot Medegislus for his lies. Lupus returned to Sens. In some accounts he is called Leu.

623 ST LUPUS, OR LEU, BISHOP OF SENS
         HAVING succeeded St Artemius in the bishopric of Sens, Lupus distinguished himself by the most zealous discharge of every pastoral duty, and showed that, as no dignity could inspire him with pride, so no application to public employment could divert him from constant attention to God. When the safety of his country demanded his assistance he was active in maintaining public order, and after the death of King Thierry II he supported his son Sigebert to the utmost of his power.
     Afterwards Clotaire became master of Burgundy and sent the Duke Farulf thither to take care of his affairs. This minister proceeded against St Lupus, who when Sens was besieged had escaped the swords of Clotaire only by ringing the church bell and thereby frightening them off. The bishop neglected the precaution of buying his safety from Farulf, who accused him falsely to the king, and was seconded in his calumnies by Medegislus, abbot of Saint-Remi at Sens, whose aim it was to supplant St Lupus in his see. The wages of the success of this unscrupulous prelate was that the people of Sens broke into his church and there slew him.
   Clotaire, being deceived by the slanderers, banished St Lupus to Auséne, a village not far from Lyons. The holy bishop on his arrival found that the people of the country worshipped false gods. By restoring sight to a blind man he converted the governor, and baptized him with several other pagans in the armies of the Franks.
In the meantime St Winebald, abbot of Troyes, and the citizens of Sens asked King Clotaire to recall St Lupus. That prince realized the injury he had done the man, and the slanders of his accusers. He therefore sent for St Lupus to ask his forgiveness, and sent him back to his church. The saint never showed the least resentment against his enemies, and by the evenness of temper with which he bore his disgrace gave the highest mark of heroism and virtue.

Among the marvels told of this saint is that one day while singing Mass a precious stone dropped miraculously into the chalice. This is referred to in the Roman Martyrology, with the guarded word refertur, “it is reported”, which is certainly called for when we consider how easily a jewel might become detached from a vestment.
         Nevertheless it was kept as a relic in the treasury of the cathedral of Sens, where also was preserved the archbishop’s episcopal ring, one of the many in legend that were dropped into water and recovered in the belly of a fish. St Lupus died in the year 623.
         The earliest Latin biography of St Lupus of Sens has been critically edited in MGH.,
         Scriptores Merov., vol. iv, pp. 176—178. B. Krusch assigns it no higher date than the ninth
         century and thinks it historically unreliable. See, however, G. Vielhaber in Analecta
         Bollandiana, vol. xxvi (1907), pp. 43—44; and cf. H. Bouvier, Histoire de l’Eglise de Sens,
         vol. i, pp. 101—106, with Duchesne, Fastes Épiscapaux, vol. ii, p. 392.
THE TWELVE BROTHERS, MARTYRS (DATE UNKNOWN)
THE twelve martyred brothers mentioned in the Roman Martyrology on this day were, according to their legend, natives of Hadrumetum in proconsular Africa and the children of SS. Boniface and Thecla, whose passion is commemorated on August 30. They were seized at Hadrumetum, brought to Carthage and tortured, and then sent into Italy chained together by the neck as they refused to apostatize.
         Four of them, Honoratus, Fortunatus, Arontius and Savinian, were put to death by beheading at Potenza on August 27 ; Septiminus, Januarius and Felix at Venosa on the 28th; Vitalis, Sator and Repositus at Velleiano on the 29th; and another Felix and Donatus at Sentiano on September 1.

These martyrs of Apulia were not in fact related to one another nor to SS. Boniface and Thecla, and were probably not Africans. But after their relics had been taken up by the Duke Arechis, in the year 760, and enshrined in the church of St Sophia at Benevento, they became associated together in the general mind and the story grew up that they were brothers from across the seas.
           What purports to be a brief history of these martyrs will be found in the Acta Sanctorum,
         September, vol. i ; but for an adequate investigation of the composition of this group we
         must have recourse to CMH., pp. 471—472 and 480-482. Cf. also Lanzoni, Le diocesi
         d’Italia, pp. 285—288.        
670? ST FIACRE sometimes miraculously restored to health those that were sick.
ST FIACRE (Fiachra) is not mentioned in the earlier Irish calendars, but it is said that he was born in Ireland and that he sailed over into France in quest of closer solitude, in which he might devote himself to God, unknown to the world. He arrived at Meaux, where St Faro, who was the bishop of that city, gave him a solitary dwelling in a forest which was his own patrimony, called Breuil, in the province of Brie. There is a legend that St Faro offered him as much land as he could turn up in a day, and that St Fiacre instead of driving his furrow with a plough turned the top of the soil with the point of his staff.

The anchorite cleared the ground of trees and briers, made himself a cell with a garden, built an oratory in honour of the Blessed Virgin, and made a hospice for travellers which developed into the village of Saint-Fiacre in Seine-et-Marne. Many resorted to him for advice, and the poor for relief. His charity moved him to attend cheerfully those that came to consult him and in his hospice he entertained all comers, serving them with his own hands, and he sometimes miraculously restored to health those that were sick. He never suffered any woman to enter the enclosure of his hermitage, and St Fiacre extended the prohibition even to his chapel several rather ill-natured legends profess to account for it. Others tell us that those who attempted to transgress were punished by visible judgements, and that, for example, in 1620 a lady of Paris, who claimed to be above this rule, going into the oratory, became distracted upon the spot and never recovered her senses; whereas Anne of Austria, Queen of France, was content to offer up her prayers outside the door, amongst the other pilgrims.
   The fame of St Fiacre’s miracles of healing continued after his death and crowds visited his shrine for centuries.
Mgr Séguier, Bishop of Meaux in 1649, and John de Châtillon, Count of Blois, gave testimony of their own relief. Anne of Austria attributed to the mediation of this saint the recovery of Louis XIII at Lyons, where he had been dangerously ill: in thanksgiving for which she made on foot a pilgrimage to the shrine in 1641. She also sent to his shrine a token in acknowledgement of his intervention in the birth of her son, Louis XIV. Before that king underwent a severe operation, Bossuet, Bishop of Meaux, began a novena of prayers at Saint-Fiacre to ask the divine blessing. His relics at Meaux are still resorted to and he is invoked against all sorts of physical ills, including venereal disease.

He is also a patron saint of gardeners and of the cab-drivers of Paris. French cabs are called fiacres because the first establishment to let coaches on hire, in the middle of the seventeenth century, was in the rue Saint-Martin, near the hotel Saint-Fiacre, in Paris. St Fiacre’s feast is kept in some dioceses of France, and throughout Ireland on this date.
          There is a Latin life of some length printed in the Acta Sanctorum, August, vol. vi, but
         it is difficult to judge of its historical value. See also Gougaud, Gaelic Pioneers of Christianity,
         pp. 135—137; L. Pfleger in Zeitschnft f. die Geschichte des Oberrheins (1918), pp. 153—173
         J.   F. Kenney, Sources . . Ireland, vol. i, p. 493; and Bächtold-Stäubli, Handwörterbuch des
         deutschcn Aberglaubens, vol. iii.
694 ST SEBBE sanctified his soul by penance, alms-deeds and prayer
         THIS prince, in the year 664, which was remarkable for a terrible pestilence, began to reign over the East Saxons, who inhabited the country which now comprises Essex, Middlesex and part of Hertfordshire; he was co-king of this region with Sighere, who, fearing that the plague was a token of the wrath of the gods whom he had abandoned, apostatized to their worship again, with many of his people.
Thereupon a bishop, Jaruman, came from Mercia to show them the error of their ways. On the authority of a priest that was with him, St Bede says he was a very discreet, religious and good man, and was successful in his mission. In it the bishop had the support of Sebbe, who was by his wise government the father of his people, who sanctified his soul by penance, alms-deeds and prayer, so that many said he was more suited by disposition to be a bishop than a king.
   When he had reigned for thirty years, he resigned his crown, which he had long desired to do in order to be more at liberty to prepare himself for his last hour; but his queen had resolutely refused to agree to a separation and was only won over at last by the ill-health of her husband, which presaged that his death was not far off.

St Sebbe received the monastic habit from Waldhere, successor of St Erconwald in the bishopric of London, whom he charged with the distribution of his personal estate among the poor. “ When the aforesaid sickness increased upon him”, says St Bede, “and he perceived the day of his death to be drawing near, being a man of royal disposition he began to apprehend lest, when under pain and the approach of death, he might be guilty of anything unworthy of his person, either in words or any movement of his limbs. Wherefore, calling to him the said bishop of London, in which city he then was, he asked him that none might be present at his death besides the bishop himself and two attendants.” Shortly after, this truly royal man died, and was buried against the north wall of old St Paul’s. He is named in the Roman Martyrology on August 29, having been added thereto by Cardinal Baronius in the sixteenth century, and his feast is kept in the diocese of Brentwood on September
           All that we know of St Sebbe is derived from Bede, Eccl. Hist., bk iii, ch. 30, and bk iv,
         ch. ii. There would seem to be no trace of liturgical cultus until modern times.
700 ST DRITHELM visions of afterlife when separated from his body
         ST Bede in the fifth book of his Ecclesiastical History relates what he calls “a memorable miracle, like to those of former days”.
   It concerns a man called Drithelm, who was a householder in Northumbria and a person of virtuous life, father of a God-fearing family. Somewhere about the year 693 he was seized with an illness and one evening appeared to be dead, but the next morning he suddenly sat up, to the fear of those mourning around his body, who all fled except his wife.  To her he said: “Be not afraid, for I am now truly risen from death and allowed again to live among men. But hereafter I am not to live as I have been wont but rather in a very different manner.” He then went to pray in the church of the village and afterwards returned to his house where he made a division of his goods, one-third to his wife, one-third to his children, and the remaining third to the poor. He then made his way to King Aldfrid and told him his story, and at the king’s request St Ethelwald, who was then abbot of Melrose, tonsured Drithelm and admitted him among his monks.
           Now the things which Drithelm had seen, and which
“ he would not tell to tepid persons and such as lived negligently, but only to those who, being feared with the dread of Hell or delighted with the hope of heavenly joys, would make use of his words to advance in religion”,
were these After he was dead he had been met by one with a shining countenance and bright garments who led him towards the north-east, where sunrise is at midsummer. There was a great valley, whereof one side was burning with flames and the other frozen with ice and snow, and everywhere were men’s souls which seemed to be tossed from one side to the other as it were by a storm. Drithelm thought that this might be Hell, but his guide said it was not so and led him on till they came to a great fiery pit, on the edge of which Drithelm was left alone. The souls of folk were cast about in this pit and Drithelm could discern a priest, a layman, and a woman; cries and lamentations and a horrible stench rose from the flames, and evil spirits of repulsive aspect were about to push Drithelm in. But his guide appeared again and led him forward, now towards the south-east, to the quarter where the sun rises in winter, and they came out into an atmosphere of clear light where there was an endless unpierced wall. He found himself on the top of this wall, and within was a large and delighful field, “so full of fragrant flowers that the smell of their sweetness at once dispelled the stink of the dark furnace, which had pierced me through and through”.
         In this field were innumerable men and women, clothed in white and rejoicing together in groups, so that Drithelm thought that perhaps this was the kingdom of Heaven. But his guide said: “ This is not the kingdom of Heaven as you suppose.” Then they went yet further and came to a place of light and singing and delight, beside which the first field was dull and bleak, and Drithelm was hoping that they would enter into that place, when his guide suddenly stopped, turned round, and led him back by the way they had come to the first field.
           Here he turned to Drithelm and said : “ The valley of flames and cutting cold is the place where are tried the souls of those who have delayed to repent and confess their sins, but have done so at the point of death. And they shall be delivered at the day of Judgement, and some before then because of the prayers and alms-deeds and Masses of the living. The fiery and stinking pit which you saw is the mouth of Hell, into which whosoever is cast shall not be delivered for all eternity. This flowery place, in which you see these beautiful young people so shining and merry, is that into which are received for a space the souls who depart the body in good works But are not so perfect that they may at once he taken into Heaven. Whoever leave life perfect in thought, word, and deed are called at once into the kingdom of Heaven, of which you heard the singing, smelled the fragrance, and saw the light. As for you, who are now to return to your body and live among men again, if you will try nicely to examine your actions and direct your speech and behaviour in righteousness and simplicity, you shall have a place among the blessed souls. For when I left you for a white it was to learn what was to be your doom.”
Then Drithelm, fearing to ask any more questions, found himself living and among men once more.
           St Drithelm lived for the rest of his days in a cell on the banks of the Tweed, into the freezing waters of which he would sometimes cast himself by way of penance, and stand reciting his office with ice floating around him. At which some would say: “It is wonderful, Brother Drithelm that you can stand such cold.” And he, being a man “of much simplicity and indifferent wit”, would reply simply, “I have seen greater cold.” Or if they said, “It is strange how you can endure such hardship”, he would answer, “I have seen greater hardship.”
         In such ways he continued to mortify his body till the day of his death and forwarded the salvation of many by his words and example. One such was a priest and monk called Hemgils, of whom St Bede wrote: “He is still living, and leading a solitary life in Ireland where he supports his declining years with coarse bread and cold water. He often went to Drithelm and heard of him all the particulars of what he had seen when separated from his body; by whose relations we also came to the knowledge of the few particulars which we have briefly set down.”
There has been no known cultus of St Drithelm, but Alcuin refers to him in his poem on the saints of the church of York. Bishop Challoner mentions him under this date in his Memorials of Ancient British Piety.
           We know little of Drithelm beyond what is contained in Bede’s Historia Ecclesiastica
         (see Plummer’s edition and notes) but Abbot Aelfric devotes a homily to the vision (ed.
         B. Thorpe, vol. ii, pp. 348—3 56). Cf. also St John Seymour, Irish Visions of the Other World
         (1930), especially pp. 154—156.       

St. Lythan Titular saint of two churches in Wales
He is sometimes listed as Llythaothaw and Thaw.
St. Vincent & Laetus Two Spanish martyrs
In Hispániæ sanctórum Mártyrum Vincéntii et Læti.    In Spain, the holy martyrs Vincent and Laetus.
They are possibly synonymous with St. Vincent, patron of Dax, Gascony, France, and St. Laetus, a deacon to St. Vincent. Traditionally, they are venerated in Toledo.
The Miasena Icon of the Most Holy Theotokos was trhrown into Lake Zagura in the ninth century in an effort to save it from  the iconoclasts. After a long time, the wonderworking icon emerged from the water unharmed and was brought to the Miasena Monastery.
1231 BB. JOHN OF PERUGIA AND PETER OF SASSOFERRATO, MARTYRS miracles reported at their tomb
         AMONG the Friars Minor whom St Francis of Assisi sent into Spain to preach the gospel to the Moors were Brother John, a priest of Perugia, and Brother Peter, a lay-brother from Sassoferrato in Piceno. These two friars established themselves at Teruel in Aragon, living in cells near the church of St Bartholomew, and there for some time prepared themselves for their apostolate. Their poverty and lowliness won the love and attention of the people of the place, and their lives and preaching bore much fruit. They then went on to Valencia, which was completely under the dominion of the Moors, and took up their quarters quietly at the church of the Holy Sepulchre. But directly the friars attempted to preach in public the Mohammedans turned against them they were arrested and brought before the  emir. He asked what had brought them to Valencia, and Bd John replied that they came to convert the Moors from the errors of Islam. They were then offered the usual alternatives of apostasy or death, and when they chose death were condemned to be beheaded. The sentence was carried out then and there in the emir’s garden, the martyrs praying aloud for the conversion of their persecutor. This was on August 29, 1231.
           Seven years later James I the Conqueror, King of Aragon, drove the Moors from Valencia with the help of his English and other mercenaries, and in accordance with the martyrs’ prayer the emir became a Christian. He gave his house to the Franciscans for a friary, saying to them “While I was an unbeliever I killed your brethren from Teruel, and I want to make reparation for my crime. Here, then, is my house at your disposal, consecrated already by the blood of martyrs.” The bodies of BB. John and Peter had been taken to Teruel, where miracles were reported at their tomb, and so a church was erected at the new friary at Valencia in their honour. They were beatified in 1783.
           An account of these martyrs is given in the Acta Sanctorum, August, vol. vi, where their
         story is reproduced as told by St Antoninus of Florence. An older narrative of the martyr-
         dom has been printed in the Analecta Franciscana, vol. iii, pp. 186—187. See also Léon,
         Auréole Séraphique (Eng. trans.), vol. iii, pp. 96—97.
1490  St. Beatrice da Silva Meneses founderss
Beatrice was born in Ceuta, Portugal, in 1424. She was the daughter of the Count of Viana, and the sister of St. Amedeus of Portugal. In Portugal, Beatrice is known as Brites. Raised in the household of Princess Isabel, Beatrice went to Spain with her when Isable married John II of Castile. Evenually, she tired of court life and entered the Cistercian convent at Toledo.

In 1484, Beatrice founded the Congregation of the Immaculate Conception of the Blessed Virgin Mary. The groups first house was the castle of Galliana, a gift from Queen Isabel. Beatrice died at Toledo on September 1, 1490 and was canonized by Pope Paul VI in 1976.

In his own wisdom, God calls each individual to a particular vocation. The life of St. Beatrice reminds us of how important it is for us to be always open to God's designs in our regard, and to pray that his will be done .
St. Fiacre Patron of Gardeners and Cab-drivers
St. Fiacre (Fiachra) is not mentioned in the earlier Irish calendars, but it is said that he was born in Ireland and that he sailed over into France in quest of closer solitude, in which he might devote himself to God, unknown to the world. He arrived at Meaux, where Saint Faro, who was the bishop of that city, gave him a solitary dwelling in a forest which was his own patrimony, called Breuil, in the province of Brie. There is a legend that St. Faro offered him as much land as he could turn up in a day, and that St. Fiacre, instead of driving his furrow with a plough, turned the top of the soil with the point of his staff. The anchorite cleared the ground of trees and briers, made himself a cell with a garden, built an oratory in honor of the Blessed Virgin, and made a hospice for travelers which developed into the village of Saint-Fiacre in Seine-et-Marne.
Many resorted to him for advice, and the poor, for relief. His charity moved him to attend cheerfully those that came to consult him; and in his hospice he entertained all comers, serving them with his own hands, and sometimes miraculously restored to health those that were sick. He never allowed any woman to enter the enclosure of his hermitage, and Saint Fiacre extended the prohibition even to his chapel; several rather ill-natured legends profess to account for it. Others tell us that those who attempted to transgress, were punished by visible judgements, and that, for example, in 1620 a lady of Paris, who claimed to be above this rule, going into the oratory, became distracted upon the spot and never recovered her senses; whereas Anne of Austria, Queen of France, was content to offer up her prayers outside the door, amongst the other pilgrims.

The fame of Saint Fiacre's miracles of healing continued after his death and crowds visited his shrine for centuries. Mgr. Seguier, Bishop of Meaux in 1649, and John de Chatillon, Count of Blois, gave testimony of their own relief. Anne of Austr ia attributed to the meditation of this saint, the recovery of Louis XIII at Lyons, where he had been dangerously ill; in thanksgiving for which she made, on foot, a pilgrimage to the shrine in 1641. She also sent to his shrine, a token in acknowledgement of his intervention in the birth of her son, Louis XIV. Before that king underwent a severe operation, Bossuet, bishop of Meaux, began a novena of prayers at Saint-Fiacre to ask the divine blessing. His relics at Meaux are still resorted to, and he is invoked against all sorts of physical ills, including venereal disease. He is also a patron saint of gardeners and of cab-drivers of Paris. French cabs are called fiacres because the first establishment to let coaches on hire, in the middle of the seventeenth century, was in the Rue Saint-Martin, near the hotel Saint-Fiacre, in Paris. Saint Fiacre's feast is kept in some dioceses of France, and throughout Ireland on this date. Many miracles were claimed through his working the land and interceding for others .
There is a Latin life of some length printed in the Acta Sanctorum, August, vol. vi, but it is difficult to judge of its historical value. See also Gougaud, Gaelic Pioneers of Christianity, pp. 135—137; L. Pfleger in Zeitschrift f. die Geschichte des Oberrheins (1918), pp. 153—173; J. F. Kenney, Sources...Ireland, vol. i, p. 493; and Bächtold-Stäubli, Handwörterbuch des deutschen Aberglaubens, vol. iii.
724 St. Giles Abbot; longed for a hidden life; spent many years in solitude conversing only with God in Nimes; France; the highest repute for sanctity and miracles; His cult spread rapidly far and wide throughout Europe in the Middle Ages, as is witnessed by the numberless churches and monasteries dedicated to him in France, Germany, Poland, Hungary, and the British Isles; by the numerous manuscripts in prose and verse commemorating his virtues and miracles; and especially by the vast concourse of pilgrims who from all Europe flocked to his shrine. (Patron of Physically Disabled)
In província Narbonénsi sancti Ægídii, Abbátis et Confessóris, cujus nómine est appellátum óppidum, quod póstea crevit in loco, ubi ipse monastérium eréxerat et mortális vitæ cursum absólverat.
    In the province of Narbonne, St. Giles, abbot and confessor.  A town which later arose in the place where he had built his monastery and where he died was named after him.

ST GILES, ABBOT (DATE UNKNOWN)
THE legend of St Giles (Aegidius), one of the most famous of the middle ages, is derived from a biography written in the tenth century. According to this he was an Athenian by birth, and during his youth cured a sick beggar by giving him his own cloak, after the manner of St Martin.

Giles dreaded temporal prosperity and the applause of men which, after the death of his parents, was showered on him because of the liberality of his alms and his miracles. He therefore took ship for the west, landed at Marseilles, and, after passing two years with St Caesarius at Arles, eventually made his hermitage in a wood near the mouth of the Rhóne. In this solitude he was for some time nourished with the milk of a hind, which was eventually pursued by a certain king of the Goths, Flavius, who was hunting in the forest. The beast took refuge with St Giles in his cave, and the hounds gave up their chase on the following day the hind was found again and the same thing happened ; and again on the third day, when the king had brought with him a bishop to watch the peculiar behaviour of his hounds. This time one of the huntsmen shot an arrow at a venture into the bushes which screened the cave, and when they had forced their way through they found Giles, wounded by the arrow, sitting with the hind between his knees. Flavius and the bishop approached and asked the hermit to give an account of himself, and when they heard his story they begged his pardon and promised to send physicians to attend him. Giles begged them to leave him alone and refused all the gifts they pressed upon him.
           King Flavius continued frequently to visit St Giles, who eventually asked him to devote his proffered alms to founding a monastery; the king agreed to do provided Giles would become its first abbot. In due course the monastery was built near the cave, a community gathered round, and the reputation of the monks and of their abbot reached the ears of Charles, King of France (whom medieval romancers identified as Charlemagne).
Giles was sent for to the court at Orleans, where the king consulted him on spiritual matters but was ashamed to name a grievous sin that was on his conscience. On the following Sunday, when the holy man was celebrating Mass according to custom and praying to God for the king during the canon, an angel of the Lord appeared to him and laid on the altar a scroll on which was written the sin which the king had committed, and which further said that he would be forgiven at Giles intercession, provided he did penance and desisted from that sin in the future. . . . When Mass was ended Giles gave the scroll to the king to read, who fell at the saint’s feet, begging him to intercede with the Lord for him. And so the man of the Lord commended him to God in prayer and gently admonished him to refrain from that sin in the future.”
         St Giles then returned to his monastery and afterwards went to Rome to commend his monks to the Holy See. The pope granted them many privileges and made a present of two carved doors of cedar-wood to emphasize his trust in divine providence St Giles threw these doors into the Tiber, and they safely preceded him to France. After being warned of his approaching end in a dream, he died on a Sunday, September 1, “leaving the world sadder for his bodily absence but giving joy in Heaven by his happy arrival”.
           This and other medieval accounts of St Giles, our sole source of information, are utterly untrustworthy some of their statements are obviously self-contradictory and anachronistic, and the legend is associated with certain papal bulls which are known to be forgeries made in the interests of the monastery of Saint-Gilles in Provence.

The most that is known of St Giles is that he may have been a hermit or monk near the mouth of the Rhóne in the sixth or eighth century, and that his relics were claimed by the famous monastery that bore his name. The story of the hind is told of several saints, of whom Giles is the best known, and for many centuries he was one of the most popular of saints. He is numbered among the Fourteen Holy Helpers (the only one of them who is not a martyr) and his tomb at his monastery became a place of pilgrimage of the first importance, contributing much to the medieval prosperity of the town of Saint-Gilles, which was, however, badly damaged by the crusade against the Albigensians in the thirteenth century. Other crusaders named another town Saint-Gilles (now Sinjil), on the borders of Benjamin and Ephraim, and his cult spread throughout western Europe; England had so many as 160 parish churches dedicated in his honour, and he was invoked as the patron of cripples, beggars and blacksmiths. John Lydgate, monk of Bury in the fifteenth century, invokes him as
        
                   Gracious Giles, of poor folk chief patron,
                    Medicine to sick in their distress,
                   To all needy shield and protection,
                    Refuge to wretches, their damage to redress,
                    Folk that were dead restoring to quickness.
        
           The text of the Latin life of St Giles is printed in the Acta Sanctorum, September, vol. i,
         and another recension In the Analecta Bollandiana, vol. viii (1889), pp. 103—120. There is
         also a metrical version and an adaptation in old French. For these last consult the careful
         study of Miss E. C. Jones, Saint Gilles essai d’histoire Iitteraire (1914). For the folklore
         which has gathered round the name of St Giles see Bachtold-Staubli, Handwerterbuch des
         deutschen Aberglaubens, vol. i, pp. 212 seq., and, for the treatment in art, Künstle, Ikonographie,
         vol. ii, pp. 32—34 this saint’s distinctive emblem, as might he expected, is a hind with an
         arrow. For English readers an excellent account of St Giles and his cultus is provided in
         F. Entrain, Saint Giles (1928). See also F. Eoulard, Saint Gilles (1933) and A. Fliche,
         Aigues-Mortes et Saint-Gilles (1950). Pope Benedict XIV’s commission projected the removal
         of this feast from the general calendar.

St. Giles is said to have been a seventh century Athenian of noble birth. His piety and learning made him so conspicuous and an object of such admiration in his own country that, dreading praise and longing for a hidden life, he left his home and sailed for France. At first he took up his abode in a wilderness near the mouth of the Rhone river, afterward near the river Gard, and, finally, in the diocese of Nimes.

He spent many years in solitude conversing only with God. The fame of his miracles became so great that his reputation spread throughout France. He was highly esteemed by the French king, but he could not be prevailed upon to forsake his solitude. He admitted several disciples, however, to share it with him. He founded a monastery, and established an excellent discipline therein. In succeeding ages it embraced the rule of St. Benedict. St. Giles died probably in the beginning of the eighth century, about the year 724.

St. Giles (Latin Ægidius.)

An Abbot, said to have been born of illustrious Athenian parentage about the middle of the seventh century. Early in life he devoted himself exclusively to spiritual things, but, finding his noble birth and high repute for sanctity in his native land an obstacle to his perfection, he passed over to Gaul, where he established himself first in a wilderness near the mouth of the Rhone and later by the River Gard. But here again the fame of his sanctity drew multitudes to him, so he withdrew to a dense forest near Nîmes, where in the greatest solitude he spent many years, his sole companion being a hind. This last retreat was finally discovered by the king's hunters, who had pursued the hind to its place of refuge. The king [who according to the legend was Wamba (or Flavius?), King of the Visigoths, but who must have been a Frank, since the Franks had expelled the Visigoths from the neighbourhood of Nîmes almost a century and a half earlier] conceived a high esteem for solitary, and would have heaped every honour upon him; but the humility of the saint was proof against all temptations. He consented, however, to receive thenceforth some disciples, and built a monastery in his valley, which he placed under the rule of St. Benedict. Here he died in the early part of the eighth century, with the highest repute for sanctity and miracles.

His cult spread rapidly far and wide throughout Europe in the Middle Ages, as is witnessed by the numberless churches and monasteries dedicated to him in France, Germany, Poland, Hungary, and the British Isles; by the numerous manuscripts in prose and verse commemorating his virtues and miracles; and especially by the vast concourse of pilgrims who from all Europe flocked to his shrine. In 1562 the relics of the saint were secretly transferred to Toulouse to save them from the hideous excesses of the Huguenots who were then ravaging France, and the pilgrimage in consequence declined.
   With the restoration of a great part of the relics to the church of St. Giles in 1862, and discovery of his former tomb there in 1865, the pilgrimages have recommenced. Besides the city of St-Gilles, which sprang up around the abbey, nineteen other cities bear his name, St-Gilles, Toulouse, and a multitude of French cities, Antwerp, Bridges, and Tournai in Belgium, Cologne and Bamberg, in Germany, Prague and Gran in Austria-Hungary, Rome and Bologna in Italy, possess celebrated relics of St. Giles. In medieval art he is a frequent subject, being always depicted with his symbol, the hind. His feast is kept on 1 September. On this day there are also commemorated another St. Giles, an Italian hermit of the tenth century (Acta SS., XLI, 305), and a Blessed Giles, d. about 1203, a Cistercian abbot of Castaneda in the Diocese of Astorga, Spain (op. cit. XLI, 308).

St. Giles  (d. 710?)
Despite the fact that much about St. Giles is shrouded in mystery, we can say that he was one of the most popular saints in the Middle Ages. Likely, he was born in the first half of the 7th century in southeastern France. That is where he built a monastery that became a popular stopping-off point for pilgrims making their way to Compostela in Spain and the Holy Land.

In England, many ancient churches and hospitals were dedicated to Giles. One of the sections of the city of Brussels is named after him. In Germany, Giles was included among the so-called 14 Holy Helpers, a popular group of saints to whom people prayed, especially for recovery from disease and for strength at the hour of death. Also among the 14 were Sts. Christopher, Barbara and Blase. Interestingly, Giles was the only non-martyr among them. Devotion to the "Holy Helpers" was especially strong in parts of Germany and in Hungary and Sweden. Such devotion made his popularity spread. Giles was soon invoked as the patron of the poor and the disabled.
The pilgrimage center that once drew so many fell into disrepair some centuries after Giles' death.
1367 BD JOAN SODERINI, VIRGIN her tomb at once became a place of pilgrimage.
   THE Soderini were a noble family of Florence and Bd Joan was born in that city in the year 1301. From a very early age she showed herself remarkably good and devoted to God, so much so that when she told her governess, Felicia Tonia, that she knew by a revelation that she, Felicia, would shortly die, she is said to have been believed, and the governess began to look around for a successor to take charge of her pupil. As soon as she was adolescent Joan’s parents arranged a marriage for her, but the child protested and they, not too well pleased, for she was their only child, reluctantly gave their consent to her becoming a nun. At this time St Juliana Falconieri was organizing the Servite third order regular (“ Mantellate”) in Florence, and Joan elected to join this new community. She was soon distinguished by her corporal austerities and perseverance in prayer, but at the same time was active in the work of the house and the care of the sick who came to it for attention and medicine. She voluntarily undertook the most distasteful tasks, and endeared herself to her sisters by her equability and cheerfulness. Joan was visited with hard trials and grievous temptations which she triumphed over, attaining by her faithfulness to a certain gift of prophecy. She was the constant personal attendant of St Juliana during her last long illness, when she was almost continually sick and could digest no food.

To Bd Joan is attributed the first discovery of the image of a crucifix, alleged to have been found imprinted on the chest of St Juliana after her death. She survived her beloved prioress for twenty-six years and succeeded her in the government of the community, which she sought to direct according to the example and wishes of St Juliana. Bd Joan died on September 1, 1367, and was buried in the Annunziata at Florence, where her tomb at once became a place of pilgrimage. In 1828 Count Soderini, a relative of Joan, petitioned Pope Leo XII for confirmation of this cultus, which was duly granted.
           See the Acta Sanctorum, October, vol. xii, pp. 398-404; and also A. Giani, Annales
         Ordinis Sevorum, vol. i, pp. 320—321.
1588 BD HUGH MORE, MARTYR reconciled with the Church by Father Thomas Stephenson, s.j.
         BD HUGH MORE was one of the first group of London Martyrs of 1588 (August 28).  He is accorded a separate feast today in the diocese of Nottingham, because he was born within the borders of what is now that diocese, at Grantham in 1563.
He was brought up a Protestant and educated at Broadgates Hall, Oxford, from whence he passed to Gray’s Inn. Having been reconciled with the Church by Father Thomas Stephenson, s.j., he went abroad to Rheims, where for a time he studied at the seminary. Upon returning home he was arrested, and arraigned for his reconciliation. He could have saved himself by conforming to the law of attendance at the established church, but this he refused to do; he was accordingly hanged in Lincoln’s Inn Fields on August 28, 1588. This young layman was only twenty-five years old, “one of the several young gentlemen” referred to by Father Ribadeneira in his appendix to Sander’s De Schismate anglicano whose death strongly pleaded for the cause for which they died
         See MMP., p. 136; Burton and Pollen, LEM., vol. i.
1855 Bl. Michael Ghebre Vincentian martyr of Ethiopia
also listed as Mikael Gabra. A native of that country, Michael became a Catholic in 1844 - converted by a Vincentian - and was ordained in 1851. Theodore II, the Negus of Ethiopia, launched a persecution of Catholics in 1855. Michael and four companions were arrested. Michael was dragged from place to place and died from abuse in prison on August 28. He was beatified in 1926.

1855 BD GABRA MICHAEL, MARTYR
         AFTER Bd Justin de Jacobis arrived in Ethiopia in 1839 it was not long before he came to know Abba Gabra Michael.* * Gabra Mika’el. i.e. Servant of Michael cf. the Scottish “Gilmichael” .
The name is sometimes found in a French form, Michel Ghèbrè.
Abba Gabra Michael a monk of the dissident Church of Ethiopia, a man some fifty years old who was renowned for his holiness and learning, and who was also suspected of an inclination towards Catholicity, which his fellow monks stigmatized as a taint of Arianism. Gabra Michael was not a priest, but he had studied as deeply in theology as conditions in his church allowed, going from monastery to monastery, teaching and learning. The deputation from Ethiopia to Egypt and Rome, of which Gabra Michael was a member and which Bd Justin accompanied, has been described under July 31 ; and following that experience, and much talk with Father Justin, Gabra Michael eventually in 1844 was received into the visible membership of the Catholic Church.
           The learned Abyssinian was a most valuable auxiliary for Father de Jacobis, especially in the training of native aspirants for the priesthood. Together they drew up a catechism of Christian doctrine adapted to local needs and translated a work of moral theology into Amharic, and established a college of which Gabra Michael was put in charge. This was an opportunity for Abuna Salama, head of the dissident Church, to stir up feeling against “the Franks”  which led to the ruler banishing their two leaders, who took refuge in the island of Massawa. Here Mgr Massaia consecrated Father de Jacobis bishop; he returned secretly to the scene of his mission, and his first episcopal act was to ordain Gabra Michael to the priesthood in 1851. There followed a brief period of almost startlingly successful work among the dissidents. But then came the revolt of Kassa and his seizure of the Ethiopian crown as Theodore II, and persecution flared up again.
           Gabra Michael and four of his fellow countrymen were thrown into prison and threatened with torture in order to make them apostatize. They refused ; and at intervals over a period of nine months they were dragged from their filthy cell into the presence of Theodore and his metropolitan, Salama, to be browbeaten and cajoled and each time when they stood firm they were lashed with a giraffe’s tail (whose hair is like steel wire) and otherwise tortured. “In matters of faith”, said Gabra Michael to Salama, I cannot be other then opposed to you. But so far as Christian charity is concerned I think I have never done you anything but good”—and indeed it was due to his intervention that Salama had been exiled instead of executed some years before. In March 1855 Theodore set out on an expedition against the ruler of Shoa, Gabra Michael was taken with him in chains, and on May 31 a last attempt was made to induce him to submit to the king by repudiating the true faith. He refused and was condemned to death.
Among those present was the British consul, Walter Chichele Plowden, who had supported Theodore in his usurpation; he now came forward with others and begged a reprieve for Gabra Michael, which was granted but he was to be a prisoner for life. By the mouth of a friend he sent a message to the other prisoners at Gondar “ Be steadfast to death in your faith. I have no hope of seeing you again on this earth. If they kill me, I shall die testifying to my faith ; if they spare me, I shall go on preaching it.” For three more months, decrepit with age and ill-treatment, Gabra Michael was dragged in chains from place to place in the train of the king ; he caught cholera and recovered, giving away his pittance of food to other sufferers and earning the esteem even of his guards ; at last on August 28, 1855 he lay down by the side of the road and died. His guards gently removed his chains and buried his body; and Bd Gabra Michael was beatified as a martyr in 1926.
           There is a French life of this martyr by J. B. Coulbeaux (1902), and one in Italian by E.
         Cassinari (1926). See also the sketch by G. Goyau in The Golden Legend Overseas (1931)
         and the Book of Eastern Saints (1938), by D. Attwater, pp. 136—141. Cf. bibliography of
         Bd Justin de Jacobis, July 31.
THE TWELVE BROTHERS, MARTYRS (DATE UNKNOWN)
THE twelve martyred brothers mentioned in the Roman Martyrology on this day were, according to their legend, natives of Hadrumetum in proconsular Africa and the children of SS. Boniface and Thecla, whose passion is commemorated on August 30. They were seized at Hadrumetum, brought to Carthage and tortured, and then sent into Italy chained together by the neck as they refused to apostatize.
         Four of them, Honoratus, Fortunatus, Arontius and Savinian, were put to death by beheading at Potenza on August 27 ; Septiminus, Januarius and Felix at Venosa on the 28th; Vitalis, Sator and Repositus at Velleiano on the 29th; and another Felix and Donatus at Sentiano on September 1.

These martyrs of Apulia were not in fact related to one another nor to SS. Boniface and Thecla, and were probably not Africans. But after their relics had been taken up by the Duke Arechis, in the year 760, and enshrined in the church of St Sophia at Benevento, they became associated together in the general mind and the story grew up that they were brothers from across the seas.
           What purports to be a brief history of these martyrs will be found in the Acta Sanctorum,
         September, vol. i ; but for an adequate investigation of the composition of this group we
         must have recourse to CMH., pp. 471—472 and 480-482. Cf. also Lanzoni, Le diocesi
         d’Italia, pp. 285—288.        



THE PSALTER OF THE BLESSED VIRGIN MARY PSALM 51

I will give praise to thee, O Lady, with my whole soul: I will glorify thee with my whole mind.

The works of thy grace will remain: and the testament of thy mercy before the throne of God.

By thee redemption has been sent from God: the repentant people shall have the hope of salvation.

A good understanding to all who honor thee: and their lot is among the angels of peace.

Glorious and admirable is thy name: those who keep it will not fear in the moment of death.

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]
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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, 51 2022