Commemorate the Life-Giving Spring of the Most Holy Theotokos.

  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.
April is dedicated to devotion of the Holy Eucharist and to the Holy Spirit.
2023
 From 2007 to 2021 22,500 lives been saved

Haitian Help Funding Seeds Haitian Geology AND Haitian Paintings
http://www.haitian-childrens-fund.org/

For the Son of man ... will repay every man for what he has done.

CAUSES OF SAINTS April 13  2016

The saints are a “cloud of witnesses over our head”, showing us life of Christian perfection is possible.
  Ezechiel_raphael.jpg

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..

April 13 – Our Lady of Tears (Italy)  
 A Lifetime in the Shadow of Our Lady
Jesus showed Mother Teresa what he desired from her 
It was in 1947, at the end of a year and a half of extraordinary and almost daily revelations in which Jesus showed Mother Teresa what he desired from her, that she was shown a vision in three parts, symbolizing and summarizing all that she had been told… In the first scene of the vision, Mother Teresa was shown the painful plight of the poor, and the yet greater inner poverty that was hidden beneath their material poverty. She was shown a large crowd of the poor of every kind, young and old. They were all reaching out to her as she stood in their midst, calling out for her to save them, to bring them to the one Savior—Jesus.
In the second scene, Mother Teresa saw again the same crowd of the poor. This time she could make out the sorrow and suffering in their faces. Our Lady was there in the midst of them, and Mother Teresa was kneeling at her side. Mother Teresa was turned towards the suffering children and so could not see Our Lady’s face, but she heard her say: “Take care of them—they are mine. —Bring them to Jesus—carry Jesus to them. —Fear not. Teach them to say the Rosary—the family Rosary and all will be well. —Fear not—Jesus and I will be with you and your children.”
In the third and final scene, Mother Teresa was shown the same crowd yet again. This time they were covered in darkness. There, in the midst of an anguished crowd that seemed unaware of his presence, was Jesus on the Cross. Our Lady was before him… Jesus then said to her: “I have asked you. They have asked you, and she, My Mother has asked you. Will you refuse to do this for me—to take care of them, to bring them to me?”

These visions encapsulated Mother Teresa’s call, in inner life and in her external work, for the rest of her life…
Joseph Langford MC, Mother Teresa: In the Shadow of Our Lady - Our Sunday Visitor, 2007, pp 19-20

April 13 – Our Lady of Tears (Italy)  
Mary shared the journey of her Son “to Jerusalem”
Following the events in her Son’s life, Mary shared in his drama of experiencing rejection from some of the chosen people. This rejection first appeared during his visit to Nazareth and became more and more obvious in the words and attitudes of the leaders of the people (…)
In Nazareth too she would have frequently been troubled by the disbelief of relatives and acquaintances who would try to use Jesus (cf. Jn 7:2-5) or to stop his mission (Mk 3:21). Through this suffering borne with great dignity and hiddenness, Mary shares the journey of her Son “to Jerusalem” (Lk 9:51) and, more and more closely united with him in faith, hope and love, she co-operates in salvation.
The Blessed Virgin thus becomes a model for those who accept Christ’s words (…). She teaches us to listen to the Savior with trust, to discover in him the divine Word who transforms and renews our life. Her experience also encourages us to accept the trials and suffering that come from fidelity to Christ, keeping our gaze fixed on the happiness Jesus promised those who listen to him and keep his word.
 Blessed John Paul II
General Audience, March 12, 1997
 
Mary's Divine Motherhood
Called in the Gospel "the Mother of Jesus," Mary is acclaimed by Elizabeth, at the prompting of the Spirit and even before the birth of her son, as "the Mother of my Lord" (Lk 1:43; Jn 2:1; 19:25; cf. Mt 13:55; et al.). In fact, the One whom she conceived as man by the Holy Spirit, who truly became her Son according to the flesh, was none other than the Father's eternal Son, the second person of the Holy Trinity.
Hence the Church confesses that Mary is truly "Mother of God" (Theotokos).
Catechism of the Catholic Church 495, quoting the Council of Ephesus (431): DS 251.

Blessed are those who have not seen and have believed. There is here a particular reference to ourselves; we hold in our hearts one we have not seen in the flesh. We are included in these words, but only if we follow up our faith with good works. The true believer practices what he believes. But of those who pay only lip service to faith, Paul has this to say: They profess to know God, but they deny him in their works. Therefore James says: Faith without works is dead. -- St.Gregory the Great

Mary and Diana (I) April 13 - Our Lady of Tears
In 1922 the servant of God Archbishop Fulton J. Sheen, then a young priest and scholar, was offered to accompany a distinguished French novelist, Emile Baumann, on a trip tracing the travels of Saint Paul. Baumann's book was eventually published in more than 100 editions. Here is an interesting excerpt showing Mary's early role in the Church:
"One other moment in the voyage among countless ones that affected me was the visit to the city of Ephesus. When I saw it, it was a wilderness; when St Paul saw it, it was called the "Treasure House of Asia." He looked out on the great glory of the temple of Diana as she was called in Latin or Artemis as she was known in Greek--one of the Seven Wonders of the World. It was 425 feet long, 220 feet wide and 60 feet wide. The altar itself had been carved by Praxiteles, the greatest of all the Greek sculptors. Each of the 127 columns was of Parian marble weighing 150 tons, measuring 60 feet high and decorated in gold and precious stones. Eight of these columns I saw later in the Church of Santa Sophia in former Constantinople.

(...) Paul began preaching in the synagogue and then later on after it rejected him, he taught in the school of Tyrannus, the heathen Sophist who specialized in rhetoric and philosophy. During the month of May, which was the sacred month of Diana, Paul noticed that the drunkenness, debauchery and worship of Diana was beginning to decline, since he preached that there were no gods made with hands. Consequently there was in Ephesus muttered curses against him; finally, the ill-concealed exasperation came to an end when the chief victim of the decline of idol worship began to protest against Paul. His name was Demetrius; he had built a considerable business in the manufacture of little silver shrines and images of Diana which he sold to pilgrims on their visits to the temple. Also affected were the sacred slaves and musicians of the temple, as well as skilled artisans and ordinary workman.
Taken from Treasure In Clay, The Autobiography of Fulton J. Sheen, Image Books, 1982
1947 Jesus showed Mother Teresa what he desired from her 
 593 B.C. The Commemoration of the Great Prophet Ezekiel, the son of Buzi.
 150 or 170 or 250 St. Carpus martyred in Pergamos with others bishop of Gurdos, Lydia
 303 St. Maximus Martyr with his brothers Dadas Quintilian from Dorostorum (now Silistraia) on the Danube Bulgaria beheaded at Ozobia
 303 The Hieromartyr Artemon was born of Christian parents in Laodicea, Syria many miracles talking animals etc. commemorated on March 24 on the Greek calendar.
       The Holy Martyr Crescens (Kreskes) was descended from an illustrious family and lived in Myra of Lycia
 396 Saint Ursus of Ravenna revived celebration of the feasts B
Romæ, in persecutióne Marci Antoníni Veri et Lúcii Aurélii Cómmodi, pássio sancti Justíni, Philósophi et Mártyris
Pérgami, in Asia, in eádem persecutióne, natális sanctórum Mártyrum Carpi, Thyatirénsis Epíscopi, Pápyli Diáconi et Agathonícæ
 476 The Holy martyr Thomais was born into a Christian family in the city of Alexandria raised in piety loved to read spiritual books miracle appeared after death
 530 Saint Martius the hermit attracted disciples founded For them the friary of Clermont Abbot (RM
583-586 St. Hermengild Prince of Visigothic Spain arian convert martyred for his faith
 656 Pope Saint Martin I martyred for defending dual nature of Jesus died at Kherson Crimea last pope die a martyr
 838 Saint Guinoc Bishop of Scotland Guinoc's prayers helped king vanquish Picts B (AC
1113 Blessed Ida of Boulogne descendent of Blessed Charlemagne Benedictine oblate Widow (AC)
1124 St. Caradoc Welsh hermit harpist
1292 BD JAMES OF CERTALDO, ABBOT he early developed a vocation to the religious life: devotion and austerity greatly edified all who came into contact with him
1300 Blessed Ida of Louvain OSB Cist. V (PC)
1320 Blessed Margaret of Città di Castello born blind abandoned then adopted very holy favored with heavenly visions many miracles V (AC)
1392 Blessed James of Certaldo parish priest 40 yrs OSB Cam. (AC)
1642 Blessed Edward Catherick priest missionary 44 yrs English Martyr M (AC)
April 13 - Apparition of Our Lady to Bl. Jane of Mantua (1640)  The Myrrh-Streaming Icon (II)

Jose Munoz asked whether he could buy this icon, which had so much impressed him, but was told repeatedly that it was the first icon to have been painted at this skete and was not for sale. The Virgin was like the patroness of the studio.  That night at divine service, during the singing of the angelic hymn “Axion estin” to the Theotokos, Jose fell to his knees and prayed to the Mother of God. Peace came back to his soul. At dawn, as Jose and his friend were about to depart, the abbot came to them holding the icon. During the night he had received an interior order. He said, “This icon will be a sign in the west.” The icon was not for sale, it was an offering, a grace.  However, Jose Munoz felt the urge to go back into the Iveron monastery and ask to touch his icon to the original wonder-working Iveron icon. In this religion of the people, in a carnal world where the magic of love reigns, an icon is venerated by kissing it, posing one’s cheek against it for a moment. So Jose, in this same manner, placed his copy up close to its model as if he were hoping to capture some of its force through simple contact.  Adapted from an article published in France Catholique Magazine, 30 May 1986 by Olivier Clément
"All the ends of the earth shall remember and turn to the Lord;
and all the families of the nations shall worship before him" (Psalm 21:28)
Today we commemorate the Life-Giving Spring of the Most Holy Theotokos.
There once was a beautiful church in Constantinople dedicated to the Mother of God, which had been built in the fifth century by the holy Emperor Leo the Great (January 20) in the Seven Towers district.  Before becoming emperor, Leo was walking in a wooded area where he met a blind man who was thirsty and asked Leo to help him find water. Though he agreed to search for water, he was unable to find any. Suddenly, he heard a voice telling him that there was water nearby. He looked again, but still could not find the water. Then he heard the voice saying "Emperor Leo, go into the deepest part of the woods, and you will find water there. Take some of the cloudy water in your hands and give it to the blind man to drink.Then take the clay and put it on his eyes. Then you shall know who I am." Leo obeyed these instructions, and the blind man regained his sight. Later, St Leo became emperor, just as the Theotokos had prophesied.
Leo built a church over the site at his own expense, and the water continued to work miraculous cures. Therefore, it was called "The Life-Giving Spring."

After the Fall of Constantinople in 1453, the church was torn down by the Moslems, and the stones were used to build a mosque. Only a small chapel remained at the site of the church. Twenty-five steps led down into the chapel, which had a window in the roof to let the light in. The holy Spring was still there, surrounded by a railing.
After the Greek Revolution in 1821, even this little chapel was destroyed and the Spring was buried under the rubble. Christians later obtained permission to rebuild the chapel, and work began in July of 1833. While workmen were clearing the ground, they uncovered the foundations of the earlier church. The Sultan allowed them to build not just a chapel, but a new and beautiful church on the foundations of the old one.
Construction began on September 14, 1833, and was completed on December 30, 1834.
Patriarch Constantine II consecrated the church on February 2, 1835, dedicating it to the Most Holy Theotokos.

The Turks desecrated and destroyed the church again on September 6, 1955. A smaller church now stands on the site, and the waters of the Life-Giving Spring continue to work miracles.

There is also a Life-Giving Spring Icon of the Most Holy Theotokos which is commemorated on April 4.
KONTAKION Tone 8 O most favored by God, you confer on me the healing of your grace from your inexhaustible Spring. Therefore, since you gave birth incomprehensibly to the Word, I implore you to refresh me with the dew of your grace that I might cry to you: Hail, O Water of salvation.

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.






























593 B.C. The Commemoration of the Great Prophet Ezekiel, the son of Buzi.
On this day the great prophet Ezekiel the son of Buzi departed.
This righteous man was a priest, and Nebuchadnezzar exiled him with king Jehoiachin to Babylon.
There in the land of the Chaldeans by the river Chebar, the spirit of the Lord was upon him, and he prophesied about wondrous things for twenty two years.
 
He spoke concerning the birth of the Lord Christ by the Lady the Virgin St. Mary
and how after she had borne Him, she would remain a virgin:
"Then He brought me back to the outer gate of the sanctuary which faces toward the east,
 but it was shut. And the LORD said to me,
"This gate shall be shut; it shall not be opened, and no man shall enter by it, because the LORD God of Israel
has entered by it; therefore it shall be shut" (Ezekiel 44:1-2).

He prophesied concerning the baptism that sanctify the soul of the man and his body, soften his stony heart, and make him a son of God by the descent of the Holy Spirit upon him.
He admonished the priests for their forsaken the teaching of the people, warning them that God will ask for their souls from them if they neglect teaching them.
He prophesied concerning the common resurrection and the rising of the bodies with their souls, and about their rewards for whatever they deserve. He said many useful sayings which are of benefit to those who read them, and God manifested through him many signs and great wonders. When the children of Israel worshipped idols in Babylon, he rebuked them and their leaders rose up and killed him. They buried him in the tomb of Shem and Arphaxad.
May his prayers be with us. Amen
The Prophet Ezekiel ("God is strong") was the son of Buzi and a priest by rank.
He was taken captive and brought to Babylon during the reign of Jechonias.
In the fifth year of this captivity, about 594 or 593 B.C., he began to prophesy.

Having prophesied for about twenty-eight years, he was murdered, it is said, by the tribe of Gad, because he reproached them for their idolatry.

His book of prophecy, divided into forty-eight chapters, is ranked third among the greater Prophets. It is richly filled with mystical imagery and marvelous prophetic visions and allegories, of which the dread Chariot of Cherubim described in the first Chapter is the most famous; in the "gate that was shut," through which the Lord alone entered, he darkly foretold of the Word's Incarnation from the Virgin (44:1-3); through the "dry bones" that came to life again (37:1-14), he prophesied both of the restoration of captive Israel, and the general resurrection of our race.
150 or 170 or 250 St. Carpus martyred in Pergamos with others bishop of Gurdos, Lydia
Papylus, Agathonica, Agathodorus. Carpus was the bishop of Gurdos, Lydia. Papylus was a deacon. Agathonica was a mother and Papylus’ sister, and Agathodorus was their servant They were martyred in Pergamos.Agathonica, Papylus (Pamfilus), Carpus & Companions MM (RM)

170 OR 250 SS. CARPUS, PAPYLUS AND AGATHONICE, MARTYRS
IN the reign either of Marcus Aurelius or of Decius, a bishop, Carpus, from Gurdos in Lydia, and Papylus, a deacon from Thyateira, were together brought before the Roman governor at Pergamos in Asia Minor. Carpus, when he was asked his name, replied, “My first and noblest name is that of Christian: but if you want to know my worldly name, it is Carpus”. The proconsul invited him to offer sacrifice. “I am a Christian”, replied the prisoner. “I worship Christ, the Son of God, who came in these latter times to save us and who has delivered us from the snares of the Devil. I do not sacrifice to idols like these.” The governor ordered him to obey the emperor’s commands without more ado. “The gods that have not made heaven and earth shall perish”, protested Carpus, quoting from the prophet Jeremias, and he declared that the living do not sacrifice to the dead. “Do you think the gods are dead?” asked the magistrate. “They were never even living men that they should die”, retorted the martyr, when he was cut short and delivered to the torturers to be strung up and flayed.
The governor then cross-examined Papylus, who said he was a citizen of Thyateira. “Have you any children?” “Yes, many.” A bystander explained that this was a Christian mode of speech and that he meant that he had children according to the faith. “I have children according to God in every city and province”, insisted the deacon.. “Will you sacrifice or will you not?” asked the proconsul impatiently; and Papylus made reply, “I have served God from my youth and have never sacrificed to idols. I am a Christian and that is the only answer you will get from me—there is nothing greater or nobler that I could say.” He also was hung up and tortured. When it became evident that nothing could shake their fortitude, they were condemned to be burnt at the stake.  Papylus was the first to pass to his reward. As Carpus was fastened to the stake there came over his face an expression of such great joy that a bystander asked him what he was smiling at he replied, “I saw the glory of God and was glad”. ”.[ * Another version attributes these words to Papylus.] When the flames were leaping up, he cried aloud with his dying breath, “Blessed art thou Lord Jesus Christ, Son of God, because thou hast deigned to give to me, a sinner, this part with thee.”
Then the governor had the God-fearing Agathonice brought before him, and she too refused to sacrifice to the gods. The bystanders urged her to spare herself and remember her children; but she answered, “My children have God, and He will look after them”. The proconsul threatened her with a death like the others, but Agathonice remained unmoved. So she too was taken to the place of execution, and when her clothing was removed the crowd marvelled at her beauty.  As the fire was kindled, Agathonice exclaimed, “Help me, Lord Jesus Christ, since I must hear this for thee”. And as she prayed thus a third time her spirit departed.
  These simple martyr-acts rank as belonging to almost the highest class of those which are preserved to us. One has, however, to add “almost”, for, as the texts published by Pio Franchi de’ Cavalieri in Studie Testi, no. 33 (1920) clearly show, all the existing recensions have undergone some process of retrenchment or amplification. Of the antiquity of the cult, the mention by Eusebius Hist. Eccles., iv, 15) and in the Syriac “Breviarium” (where the martyrs are spoken of as forming part of the older tradition) supplies adequate proof. We do not know for certain whether they belong to the time of Marcus Aurelius or of Decius. See upon the whole question the discussion by Delehaye in Les Passions des Martyrs et les genres littéraires, pp. 138-142, and the comments of Pio Franchi mentioned above. Cf. Harnack in Texte und Untersuchungen, vol. iii, n. 4; but the newly recovered Latin text rules out his hypothesis of a Montanist origin. This text, together with the two best Greek texts, is printed in Analecta Bollandiana, vol. lviii (1940), pp. 142—176, introduced by Fr Delehaye.

Died at Pergamum c. 170 or 250. Eusebius (History of the Church, iv, 15) records that during the Decian persecution, Carpus, bishop of Gordus in Asia Minor; Papylus, deacon of Thyatira; Agathonica, the sister of Papylus; and Agathodorus, their servant, were arrested. They were brought before Valerius, the Roman governor at Pergamos in Asia Minor, examined three times, and required to sacrifice to the gods. The third time, Agathodorus, was scourged to death in front of his masters.
Still the Christians remained resolute. Carpus answered the proconsul Optimus:
"I am a Christian, I worship Christ, the Son of God, who came in these latter times for our salvation and delivered us from the snares of the devil. I will not sacrifice to such idols. The living do not sacrifice to the dead . . . (the gods) look like men, but they are unfeeling. Deprive them of your veneration . . . and they will be defiled by dogs and crows."
When the proconsul insisted, Carpus said:
"I have never before sacrificed to images that have no feeling or understanding . . . I have pity on myself, choosing as I do the better part."
Carpus was hung up to be tortured with iron claws that flayed the skin from his sides. He continued to answer steadfastly until the pain overcame his voice.
The attention of the judges turned next to Papylus, a wealthy father of many children according to his testimony. A bystander interpreted his words as "He means he has children in virtue of the faith of the Christians." Papylus agreed that this was correct. Like Carpus, he continued to refuse and was treated in the same fashion as the bishop. After a time of silent endurance, he said:
"I feel no pain because I have someone to comfort me: one whom you do not see suffers within me."
The last words of Carpus were:
"Blessed are You, Lord Jesus Christ, Son of God, because You judged me, a sinner, worthy to have this part in You!"
They refused to offer the oblations, and no arguments or ill treatment could overcome their resistance. They were therefore burnt alive in the amphitheater.
Saint Agathonica, a married woman, was admired by the crowd for her physical beauty. When they urged not to make her children motherless by her obstinacy, she replied, "God will look after them, but I will not obey your commands nor will I sacrifice to demons." She, too, went to the stake to be burnt to death. As the flames consumed her, she cried out: "Lord, Lord, Lord, help me, for I fly to You." The Christian witnesses came and took away the remains of the martyrs to cherish them.
Another version of the story relates that Agathonica was simply a woman in the crowd at the death of Carpus and Papylus, who was moved to share in their martyrdom, rather than the sister of the latter (Attwater, Attwater2, Benedictines, Coulson, Farmer, Husenbeth).
303 St. Maximus Martyr with his brothers Dadas Quintilian from Dorostorum (now Silistraia) on the Danube Bulgaria beheaded at Ozobia
Doróstori, in Mysia inferióre, pássio sanctórum Máximi, Quinctiliáni et Dadæ, in persecutióne Diocletiáni.
    At Silistria in Bulgaria, the passion of Saints Maximus, Quinctilian, and Dadas, during the persecution of Diocletian.
 They lived in Silistria on the Danube in Bulgaria until the time of their beheading by Roman authorities.

Maximus, Dadas & Quintilianus MM (RM) Maximus, Dadas, and Quintilianus, brothers from Dorostorum (now Silistraia) on the Danube, Bulgaria, were beheaded at Ozobia under Diocletian. Maximus was a lector (Benedictines).
303 The Hieromartyr Artemon was born of Christian parents in Laodicea, Syria many miracles talking animals etc. commemorated on March 24 on the Greek calendar.  in the first half of the third century. From his youth, he dedicated himself to the service of the Church. The saint served the Church as a a Reader for sixteen years.
For his zeal in Church services, Bishop Sisinius ordained him deacon. St Artemon also fulfilled this service with fervor and diligence for twenty-eight years, then he was ordained to the priesthood. In this position, St Artemon served the Church of God for thirty-three years, preaching Christianity among pagans. When the emperor Diocletian (284-305) began his fierce persecution against Christians, St Artemon was already old. The emperor issued an edict ordering Christians to offer sacrifice to idols.
Saint Sisinius, knowing of the impending arrival of the military commander Patricius in Laodicea, went with the priest Artemon and other Christians into the temple of the goddess Artemis.
There they smashed and burned the idols, reducing them all to dust.

Afterwards, St Sisinius and St Artemon gathered the flock into the church and fervently exhorted the Christians to remain firm in the Faith and not to fear the threats of torturers.  When he arrived in Laodicea, Patricius celebrated a five-day festival in honor of the pagan gods, and then went to the temple of Artemis to offer sacrifice. He learned who had destroyed the temple, and went with a detachment of soldiers to the church where the Christians were praying.   As he approached the church, Patricius suddenly felt a chill, and then developed a fever, which left him barely alive. They carried him home and put him to bed. "The Christians have put a curse on me, and their God torments me," he said to those about him. Although Patricius prayed to the idols, they did not relieve his sufferings. He sent a messenger to St Sisinius and asked for his help, promising to set up a gold statue of the bishop in the middle of the city.
The saint replied, "Keep your gold, but if you believe in Christ, He will heal you."

Patricius was afraid of dying, so he declared that he believed in Christ, and the affliction left him. But even this miracle did not affect the obdurate soul of the pagan. Although he did not touch St Sisinius, he did enforce the imperial edict against other Christians in the city of Caesarea.
Along the way he encountered St Artemon, who was followed by six wild donkeys and two deer.

When Patricius asked how he was able to control these wild beasts, St Artemon replied that he held them with the Word of Christ.   Patricius learned from the pagans that the old man was the same Artemon who had destroyed the pagan temple of Artemis. He ordered that Artemon be arrested and taken to the city of Caesarea. St Artemon went with the soldiers without fear, but he ordered the animals to go to St Sisinius.
Seeing the animals Bishop Sisinius asked, "Why have these animals come here?" A doe received the gift of speech from God and said, "The servant of God Artemon is being held by the impious Patricius, and is being brought to Caesarea in chains. He commanded us to come here to give you this news."
Do not be astonished that the Lord, Who opened the mouth of Balaam's ass (Num. 22:28), also permits the doe to speak.
The bishop sent Deacon Phileas to Caesarea to verify this information.
In Caesarea Patricius brought St Artemon to trial and tried to force him to offer sacrifice in the temple of Asclepius. In this pagan temple there lived many poisonous vipers. The pagan priest never opened the doors, nor did he place the sacrifice before the idol. But St Artemon, calling on the Name of Jesus Christ, went into the temple and released the snakes.
The pagans fled, but the saint stopped them and killed the snakes by his breath. One of the pagan priests, Vitalius, believed in Christ and asked St Artemon to baptize him.
Patricius thought that St Artemon killed the snakes by sorcery, and again he interrogated and tortured him. Then the doe which had spoken arrived in Caesarea. The doe lay down at the feet of the martyr, licking his wounds.
By God's command the doe spoke again, denouncing the impious pagans.
Addressing Patricius, the doe predicted that he would be seized by two birds of prey, and dropped into a cauldron of burning pitch. Patricius was enraged because he had been censured by a wild beast. He commanded his soldiers to shoot the doe with arrows, but she escaped. Afraid that the miracles performed by St Artemon would draw more people to him, Patricius gave orders to execute him.
They filled an enormous cauldron with boiling pitch, intending to throw the saint into it. Patricius rode up to the cauldron on horseback to see if the pitch was indeed boiling. Then two angels in the form of eagles seized Patricius and threw him into the cauldron. His body was consumed so that not a single bone remained.

Seeing the miracle, everyone ran away except St Artemon, who blessed and glorified God. When the saint finished his prayer, a spring of water issued from the ground. St Artemon baptized the pagan priest Vitalius and many pagans, who had come to believe in Christ. On the following morning St Artemon communed the newly-baptized with the Holy Mysteries.

Many of the baptized were ordained to the diaconate and priesthood, and Vitalius was made Bishop of Palestine. The hieromartyr Artemon, instructed by the voice of God, preached the Gospel in Asia Minor. Then an angel appeared to him and transported him to the place which had been revealed to him, where he converted many to Christ. Pagans seized the saint and beheaded him (+ 303).
St Artemon is commemorated on March 24 on the Greek calendar.
Artemon der Syrer  Orthodoxe Kirche: 13. April
Artemon wurde Anfang des 3. Jahrhunderts im syrischen Laodicea geboren. Von Kind an wollte er in der Kirche tätig sein und mit 16 Jahren wurde er Lektor. Er diente 12 Jahre als Lektor, wurde dann zum Diakon geweiht und übte dieses Amt 28 Jahre aus. Dann wurde er zum Priester geweiht. Nach 33 Priesterjahren wurde er in der diokletianischen Verfolgung hingerichtet, weil er sich weigerte, die heidnischen Götzen zu verehren.
Romæ, in persecutióne Marci Antoníni Veri et Lúcii Aurélii Cómmodi, pássio sancti Justíni, Philósophi et Mártyris; qui, cum secúndum librum pro religiónis nostræ defensióne præfátis Imperatóribus porrexísset, eámque ibídem disputándo strénue propugnásset, Crescéntis Cynici, cujus vitam et mores nefários redargúerat, insídiis accusátus quod Christiánus esset, remuneratiónem linguæ fidélis, martyrii munus accépit.  Ipsíus tamen festum sequénti die recólitur.
   
At Rome, in the persecution of Marcus Antoninus Verus and Lucius Aurelius Commodus, St. Justin, philosopher and martyr.  He had addressed to the emperors his second Apology in defence of our religion, and upheld it by strong arguments.  By the intrigue of Crescens the Cynic, whose conduct and immorality he had reproved, he was accused of professing Christianity, and thus he obtained the reward of martyrdom in payment for his faithful confession.  His feast is kept on the following day.
Pérgami, in Asia, in eádem persecutióne, natális sanctórum Mártyrum Carpi, Thyatirénsis Epíscopi, Pápyli Diáconi et Agathonícæ, ejúsdem Pápyli soróris et óptimæ féminæ, atque Agathadóri, eórum fámuli, aliorúmque multórum.  Hi omnes, post vários cruciátus, pro beátis confessiónibus martyrio coronáti sunt.
    At Pergamum in Asia, during the same persecution, the birthday of the holy martyrs Carpus, bishop of Thyatira, the deacon Papylus, and his sister Agathonica, an excellent woman, Agathadorus, their servant, and many others.  After many torments they received their crowns of martyrdom for their worthy confessions.
The Holy Martyr Crescens (Kreskes) was descended from an illustrious family and lived in Myra of Lycia
When a throng of city inhabitants were on the way to the pagan temple, he urged them to forsake paganism and come to Christ. This incident became known to the city prefect.
When the prefect asked the saint about his parentage, the saint, not wishing to bring unpleasantness to his parents, said nothing except that he was a Christian. The prefect knew St Crescens' father and wanted to do him a favor. He suggested that St Crescens only appear to offer sacrifice to idols, while remaining a Christian.
The holy martyr replied, "It is impossible for the body not to do as the soul thinks, since the soul governs and moves the body." They beat the holy martyr Crescens and raked him with iron claws, and then burned him in a fire.
St Andrew of Crete (July 4) mentions the Martyr Crescens in his Sermon on the Feast of St Nicholas the Wonderworker (December 6), who also came from Myra of Lycia.
396 Saint Ursus or Ravenna revived celebration of the feasts B (RM)
Ravénnæ sancti Ursi, Epíscopi et Confessóris.
    At Ravenna, St. Ursus, bishop and confessor.
 (also known as Ours)Bishop of Ravenna for 20 years, Ursus revived the celebration of the feasts of the saints in that city. Beyond that little is known of him (Attwater2, Benedictines, Encyclopedia).
476 The Holy martyr Thomais was born into a Christian family in the city of Alexandria raised in piety loved to read spiritual books miracle appeared after death
When she was fifteen, the girl married a fisherman, who was also a Christian. The young couple lived in the house of her husband's family, where St Thomais was loved for her mild and gentle disposition, and for other good traits.
St Thomais' father-in-law, at the prompting of the devil, was captivated by her beauty. One night, when his son went out fishing, he attempted to lead his daughter-in-law into sin. Horrified, St Thomais admonished the senseless old man, reminding him of the Last Judgment and the penalty for sin. Infuriated by her steadfastness, he seized a sword and threatened to cut off her head. St Thomais answered resolutely, "Even if you cut me to pieces, I shall not stray from the commandments of the Lord." Overcome with passion, the old man cut St Thomais in two with the sword. The saint received the crown of martyrdom in the year 476.

Divine punishment overtook the murderer. He became blind and could not find the door in order to escape. In the morning, the companions of the saint's husband came to the door. They saw the body of the saint, and the blind old man covered with blood. The murderer confessed his evil deed and asked to be taken to the judge for punishment. He was beheaded for his crime.

At this time, St Daniel of Skete (June 7) happened to be in Alexandria. He told the monks of the Oktodekadian monastery (at the eighteenth mile on the road leading west from Alexandria) to bring the body of the martyr to the monastery and bury her in the cemetery with the departed fathers. Some of the monks were scandalized because he wanted to bury a woman's body with the monks.
St Daniel replied, "She is a mother to me and to you, because she died for her chastity."
After the funeral St Daniel returned to his own skete. Soon one of the young monks began to complain to him that he was tormented by fleshly passions. St Daniel ordered him to go and pray at the grave of the holy martyr Thomais. The monk did the bidding of the Elder. While he prayed at the grave, he fell into a light sleep.
St Thomais appeared to him and said, "Father, accept my blessing and go in peace."
When he awakened, the monk felt joy and peace in his soul. After this, he told St Daniel that he was no longer bothered by the temptations of the flesh. Abba Daniel exclaimed,
"Great is the boldness of those who have struggled for chastity."
Many found both spiritual joy and release from their passions at the grave of St Thomais. Her holy relics were transferred to Constantinople to one of the women's monasteries. The Russian pilgrim Archdeacon Zosimas venerated them in 1420.
St Thomais is invoked by those seeking deliverance from sexual impurity.
Other saints whose intercession we seek for this purpose are:
St John the Much-Suffering (July 18) and St Moses the Hungarian (July 26).
530 Saint Martius  the hermit attracted disciples founded For them the friary of Clermont Abbot; his tomb was the scene of many miracles.
(also known as Mars) A sober-minded and austere native of Auvergne, Martius the hermit, attracted disciples. For them he founded the friary of Clermont in 530 in the mountains above the city. Some information about Martius is found in Saint Gregory of Tours' Vitae Patrum (Attwater2, Coulson, Encyclopedia).
530 ST MARTIUS, or MARS, ABBOT
THE memory of St Martius or Mars, abbot of Clermont in the Auvergne, has been preserved by St Gregory of Tours, whose father when a boy had been cured by him of a fever.

From early youth, Martius had resolved to give himself to God, and upon attaining manhood he retired from the world to lead the solitary life; he, hewed himself a hermitage in the mountain side and carved the stone bed upon which he lay. His sanctity and spiritual gifts attracted disciples who gradually formed themselves into a community, whose time was divided between prayer and the cultivation of the soil, which they converted from a desert into a flourishing garden. St Gregory of Tours tells the following anecdote. One night a thief broke into the monastery enclosure and set about rifling its apples, onions, garlic and herbs. When he had collected as much as he could carry, he attempted to depart, but was unable to find his way out in the dark. He therefore lay down on the ground to await the daylight. In the meantime Abbot Martius in his cell was fully aware of all that had happened. At the break of dawn, he summoned the prior and told him to go into the garden to release a bull which had found its way in. “Do not hurt him”, he added, and let him have all he wants, for it is written, ‘Thou shalt not muzzle the ox that treadeth out thy corn!’” The prior went forth and came upon the thief, who started up on seeing him, threw down his booty and attempted to escape. He was, however, caught by the briars. The monk smilingly released and reassured him. Then, after picking up the scattered spoil, he led the culprit to the gate where he laid the path upon the man’s shoulders saying, “Go in peace, and give up your evil ways”. St Martius lived to the age of ninety, and his tomb was the scene of many miracles.
All that we know concerning St Mars is found in the Vitae Patrum of St Gregory of Tours, ch. xiv; and see the Acta Sanctorum, April, vol. ii.
583-586 St. Hermengild Prince of Visigothic Spain arian convert  martyred for his faith
Híspali, in Hispánia, sancti Hermenegíldi Mártyris, qui fuit fílius Leovigíldi, Regis Visigothórum Ariáni; atque ob cathólicæ fidei confessiónem conjéctus in cárcerem, et, cum in solemnitáte Pascháli Communiónem ab Epíscopo Ariáno accípere noluísset, pérfidi patris jussu secúri percússus est, ac regnum cæléste pro terréno Rex et Martyr intrávit.
    At Seville in Spain, St. Hermenegild, son of Leovigild, Arian king of the Visigoths, who was imprisoned for the confession of the Catholic faith.  By order of his wicked father he was beheaded because he had refused to receive communion from an Arian bishop on the feast of Easter.  Thus exchanging an earthly for a heavenly kingdom, he entered the abode of the saints, both as a king and as a martyr.
From the Lives of Saintes by Alban Butler
APRIL XIII.
ST. HERMENEGILD, MARTYR.
From St. Gregory the Great Dial b.3 c31.  St. Gregory of Tours Illus b.5.c.30, and b.9, c.16
Mariana. Illust. B5.c. 12. Flores, Espana Sagrada, t 5. c. 2, p. 200.  Henschenius, t.2, Apr. p. 134
A. D. 586.
Levigild, or Leovigild, the Goth,* king of Spain, had two sons by his first wife, Theodosia, namely, Hermenegild and Recared.  These he educated in the Arian heresy, which he himself professed, but married Hermenegild, the eldest, to Ingondes, a zealous Catholic, and daughter to Sigebert, king of Austrasia, in France. The grandees had hitherto disposed of their crown by election, but Levigild, to secure it to his posterity, associated his two Sons with him in his sovereignty, and allotted to each a portion of his dominions to inure them to government, and Seville fell to the lot, of the eldest.  Ingondes had much to suffer from Gosvint, a bigoted Arian, whom
 * This name in original Gothic manuscript is constantly written Liuvigild, as Flores observes   He began his reign In the year of our Lord 568, of the Spanish aera 606, and puts. Hermenegild to death in the eighteenth year of his reign as is clear from an old chronicle published by Flores, Espana Sagrada, t.2 p 199
        `VOL. 11.-li.
Ingondes had much to suffer from Gosvint, a bigoted Arian, who whom Levigild had married after the death of Theodosia.  But, in spite of all her cruel treatment, she adhered strictly to the Catholic faith. And such was the force of her example, and of the instructions and exhortations of St. Leander bishop of Seville, that the prince became a convert and, taking the opportunity of his father's absence, abjured his heresy, and was received in the church by the imposition of hands, and the unction of chrism on the forehead.   Levigild, who was already exasperated against his son, upon the first appearance of his change, being now informed of his open profession of the Catholic faith, in a transport of rage divested him of the title of king, and resolved to deprive him of his possessions, his princess, and even his life, unless he returned to his former sentiments.  Hermenegild, looking upon himself as a sovereign prince, resolved to stand upon his defense, and was supported by all the Catholics in Spain; but they were by much too weak to defend him against the Arians.  The prince therefore sent St. Leander to Constantinople, to solicit Tiberius for succors.   But he dying soon after, and his successor, Maurice, being obliged to employ all his forces to defend his own dominions against the Persians, who had made many irruptions into the imperial territories, no succors were to be obtained.   Hermenegild implored next the assistance of the Roman generals, who were with a small army in that part of Spain, on the coast of the Mediterranean, of which the empire of Constantinople still retained possession.  They engaged themselves by oath to protect them, and received his wife Ingondes and infant son for hostages; but, being corrupted by Levigild’s money, they basely betrayed hm.  Levigild held his son besieged in Seville about a year, till Hermenegild, no longer able to defend himself in his capital, fled secretly to join the Roman camp; but being informed of their treachery, he went to Cordova, and thence to Osseto, a very strong place, in which there was a church, held in particular veneration over all Spain. He shut himself up in this fortress with three hundred chosen men.  But the place was taken and burnt by Levigild.   The prince sought a refuge in a church at the foot of the altar and the Arian king, not presuming to violate that sacred place, permitted his second son, Recared, then an Arian, to go to him, and to promise him pardon, in case he submitted himself and asked forgiveness.    Hermenegild believed his father sincere, and going out threw himself at his feet.  Hermenegild embraced him, and renewed his fair promises, with a thousand caresses, till he had got him into his own camp. He then ordered him to be stripped of his royal robes, loaded with chains, and conducted prisoner to the tower of Seville, in 586, when the saint had reigned two years, as Flores proves from one of his coins, and other monuments.
   There he again employed all manner of threats and promises to draw him back to his heresy, and hoping to overcome his constancy, caused him to be confined in a most frightful dungeon, and treated with all sorts of cruelty.  The martyr repeated always what he had before written to his father "I confess your goodness to me has been extreme.  I will preserve to my dying breath the respect, duty, and tenderness which I owe you; but is it possible that you should desire me to prefer worldly greatness to my salvation I value the crown as nothing?   I am ready to lose scepter and life too, rather than abandon the divine truth."   The prison was to him a school of virtue. He clothed himself in sackcloth, and added other voluntary austerities to the hardships of his confinement, and, with fervent prayers, begged of God to vouchsafe him the strength and assistance which was necessary to support him in his combat for the truth.  The solemnity of Easter being come, his perfidious father sent to him an Arian bishop in the night, offering to take him into favor, if he received the communion from the hand of that prelate.  But Hermenegild rejected the proposal with indignation, reproaching the messenger with the impiety of his sect, as if he had been at full liberty.
The bishop returning to the Arian king with this account, the furious father, seeing the faith of his son proof against all his endeavors to pervert him, sent soldiers out of hand to dispatch him. They entered the prison, and found the saint fearless and ready to receive the stroke of death, which they instantly inflicted on him, cleaving his head with an axe, whereby his brains were scattered on the floor.  St. Gregory the Great attributes to the merits of this martyr the conversion of his brother, king Recared, and of the whole kingdom of the Visigoths in Spain. Levigild was stung with remorse for his crime, and though by God's secret but just judgment he was not himself converted, yet on his death-bed he recommended his son Recared to St Leander, desiring him to instruct him in the same manner as he had done his brother Hermenegild, that is, to make him a Catholic. This saint received the crown of martyrdom on Easter Eve, the 13th of April. His body remains at Seville. St. Gregory of Tours observes, that whatever guilt this holy king and martyr incurred by taking up arms against his father, this at least was expiated by his heroic virtue and death.  Before St. Hermenegild declared himself a Catholic, the persecution was raised with great violence against the Goths, who embraced the orthodox faith of the Trinity, and many lost their goods, many were banished, and several died of hunger, or by violence.  St. Gregory of Tours ascribes not only the death of St. Hermenegild, but also this whole persecution, chiefly to the instigation of Gosvint.

  St. Hermenegild began then to be truly a king, says St. Gregory the Great, when he became a martyr.    From his first conversion to the true faith, it was his main study to square his life by the most holy maxims of the gospel. Yet, perhaps, while he lived amidst the hurry, flatteries, and pomp of a throne, his virtue was for some time imperfect, and his heart was no perfectly crucified to the world.  But humiliations and sufferings for Christ, which the saint bore with the heroic courage, the fidelity, and perfect charity of the martyrs, entirely broke all secret ties of his affections to the earth, and rendered him already a martyr in the disposition of his soul, before he attained to that glorious crown. Christ founded all the glory of his humanity and that of his spiritual kingdom, the salvation of the universe, and all the other great designs of his sacred incarnation, upon the meatiness of his poor and abject life, and his ignominious sufferings and death.  This same conduct he held in his apostles and all his saints. Their highest exaltation in his grace and glory was built upon their most profound humility and the most perfect crucifixion of their hearts to the world and themselves the foundation of which was most frequently laid by the greatest exterior as well as interior humiliations.  How sweet, how glorious were the advantages of which, by this means, they became possessed, even in this life!    God making their souls his kingdom, and by his grace and holy charity reigning sovereignly in all their affections.  "Thou hast made us a kingdom to our God, and we shall reign," say all pious souls to Christ, penetrated with gratitude for his inexpressible mercy and goodness, with esteem for his grace and love alone, and with contempt of all earthly things.   They are truly kings, depending on God alone, being in all things, with inexpressible joy, subject to him only, and to all creatures, purely for his sake  enjoying a perfect liberty, despising equally the crowns and the flatteries of the world, ever united to God.   The riches of this interior kingdom, which they possess in Christ, are incomprehensible, as St. Paul assures us. They consist in his grace, light, science of divine things, true wisdom, and sublime sentiments of his love and all virtues.  In this kingdom, souls are so replenished with the fu1ness of God, as St. Paul expresses it, that they can desire no other goods. This is to be truly rich. Joy and pleasure are possessed in this kingdom. The solid delight, sweetness, comfort, and peace, which a soul relishes in it, surpass all the heart can desire, or the understandings conceive.  Lastly, all worldly splendors is less than a dream or shadow, if compared to the dignity, glory, and honor of this happy state. Thus was St. Hermenegild a great king in his chains.   We also are invited to the same kingdom.



585 ST HERMENEGILD, Martyr
HERMENEGILD and his brother Reccared were the two Sons of the Visigothic king of Spain, Leovigild, by his first wife Theodosia. They were educated by their father in the Arian heresy, but Hermenegild married a zealous Catholic, Indegundis or Ingunda, daughter of Sigebert, king of Austrasia his conversion to the true faith was due as much to her example and prayers as to the teaching of St Leander, archbishop of Seville.
Leovigild was furious when he heard of his son’s open profession of the faith, and called upon him to resign all his dignities and possessions. This Hermenegild refused to do. He raised the standard of revolt and, as the Arians were all-powerful in Visigothic Spain, he sent St Leander to Constantinople to obtain support and assistance.
Disappointed in that quarter, Hermenegild implored the help of the Roman generals who, with a small army, still ruled the strip of Spanish land along the Mediterranean coast which remained in the possession of the Empire. They took his wife and infant son as hostages and made him fair promises which they failed to fulfil. For over a year Hermenegild was besieged in Seville by his father’s troops, and when he could hold out no longer he fled to the Roman camp—only to be warned that those he had reckoned upon as his friends had been bribed by Leovigild to betray him. Despairing of all human aid, he entered a church and sought refuge at the altar. Leovigild did not venture to violate the sanctuary, but permitted his younger son Reccared, who was still an Arian, to go to his brother with an offer of forgiveness if he would submit and ask for pardon. Hermenegild took his father at his word and a reconciliation took place, the genuineness of which there seems no reason to doubt.
Leovigild appears to have restored his elder son to some measure of bis former dignities; but the king’s second wife, Gosvinda, soon succeeded in estranging him once more from the unfortunate prince, and Hermenegild was imprisoned at Tarragona. He was no longer accused of treason but of heresy, his liberty being offered to him at the price of recantation. With fervent prayer he asked God to give him fortitude in his combat for the truth, adding voluntary mortifications to his enforced sufferings and clothing himself in sackcloth.
At Easter his father sent him an Arian bishop, offering to restore him to favour if he would receive communion from the prelate. Upon learning that Hermenegild had absolutely refused, Leovigild fell into one of the paroxysms of rage to which he was subject, and despatched soldiers to the prison with orders to put the young prince to death. They found him fully prepared and quite resigned to his fate. He was killed instantaneously by one blow from an axe.
St Gregory the Great attributes to the merits of St Hermenegild the conversion of his brother Reccared and of the whole of Visigothic Spain. Leovigild was stung with remorse for his crime, and although he never actually renounced Arianism, yet when he was on his death-bed he commended his son Reccared to St Leander, desiring him to convert him to the orthodox faith.
It is impossible to do otherwise than condemn the conduct of Hermenegild in taking up arms against his own father, but, as St Gregory of Tours has pointed out, his guilt was expiated by his heroic sufferings and death. Another Gregory, the great pope of that name, remarked of him that he only began to be truly a king when he became a martyr.
The question of Hermenegild’s title to be honoured as a martyr has been discussed with a certain amount of acrimony. Despite the account given by St Gregory the Great in his Dialogues (bk iii, ch. 31), other early writers even in Spain itself—notably the abbot of Vallclara, Johannes Biclarensis (in Florez, España Sagrada, vi, p. 384), Isidore of Seville, and Paul of Merida—seem only to suggest that Hermenegild was a rebel and put to death as such. An excellent summary of the question will be found in DCB., vol. ii, pp. 921—924. This is based mainly upon an article by F. Görres in Zeitschrift. his:. Theologie, vol. i, 1873. In  Razón y Fe Father R. Rochel (see especially vol. vii, 1903) vehemently replied to this criticism, but Father Albert Poncelet in the Analecta Bollandiana, xxiii (1904), pp. 360—361, found much that was unsatisfactory in this attempted vindication. A more moderate view is that of Gams in his Kirchengeschichte Spaniens. It should perhaps be mentioned that the best edition of the chronicle of Johannes Biclarensis is that edited by Mommsen in MGH., Auctores antiquissimi, vol. xi. A tradition of much later date identifies Seville as the scene of the “martyrdom” of St Hermenegild but Johannes Biclarensis, a contemporary, expressly declares that he was put to death at Tarragona. See Analecta Bollandiana, xxiii, p. 360. Pope Benedict XIV’s commission recommended that the feast of this saint he removed from the general calendar.
He was the son of Leovigild the Visigoth, king of Spain, and was raised as an Arian. His wife, Indegundis, converted him from that heresy, which brought about his disinheritance by Leovigild and his defeat at Seville, Spain, by his father. When Hermenegild refused to accept Arianism, he was axed to death. His feast is now confined to local calendars. 

Hermenegild, King M (RM) Died c. 583-586. Son of the Visigoth King Leovigild of Spain and his first wife, Theodosia, Saint Hermenegild was raised in Arian court of Seville. He married the Christian Inezonde (Ingunda), daughter of Sigebert of Austrasia. His conversion to orthodox Christianity was the result of the fervent prayers and virtuous example of his wife, as well as the teaching of Archbishop Saint Leander of Seville. At his conversion, his father disinherited him, whereupon he rose in arms.

Hermenegild sent Saint Leander to Constantinople to garner support. Finding no assistance there, he begged the help of the Roman generals who still governed a strip of land along the Mediterranean coast. They took his wife and son as hostages and made promises that they failed to fulfill. After being besieged by his father's troops for a full year at Seville, Hermenegild fled to the Roman camp, only to find that his father had bribed them to betray him.

Almost without hope, Hermenegild sought refuge in a church at the altar, where not even his father would violate the sanctuary. Instead, Leovigild sent his son Reccared, another Arian, to offer Hermenegild forgiveness if he would repent. Hermenegild believed his father and was reconciled for a time. Some of his former dignities were restored until Leovigild's second wife, Gosvinda, succeeded in estranging the two again. This time Hermenegild was arrested for heresy, rather than treason, and imprisoned at Tarragona. He was promised liberty if he would recant his profession of faith.

On Easter Day, his father sent the Arian bishop to him, offering to restore him to favor if he would receive the Eucharist from the prelate. Hermenegild, fortified by prayer and penance since his arrest, refused absolutely. Enraged, his father sent soldiers to behead him--which was accomplished by one blow from an axe. Saint Gregory the Great attributes the conversion of Reccared and the whole of Visigothic Spain to the witness of Hermenegild; however, many dispute his entitlement to be honored as a martyr (Attwater2, Benedictines, Coulson, Encyclopedia, Walsh).

Saint Hermenegild is depicted in art as a young prince wearing armor and being borne to heaven while contemplating the crucifix. Angels carry an axe, chains, royal regalia, a palm, and a rose wreath. Heretical bishops and king stand below. He might also be shown as a prince with an axe (Roeder). Venerated in Spain (Roeder).
656 Pope Saint Martin I martyred for defending dual nature of Jesus died at Kherson in the Crimea last pope to die a martyr
 St. Martin I  
When Martin I became pope in 649, Constantinople was the capital of the Byzantine empire and the patriarch of Constantinople was the most influential Church leader in the eastern Christian world. The struggles that existed within the Church at that time were magnified by the close cooperation of emperor and patriarch.
A teaching, strongly supported in the East, held that Christ had no human will. Twice emperors had officially favored this position, Heraclius by publishing a formula of faith and Constans II by silencing the issue of one or two wills in Christ.
Shortly after assuming the office of the papacy (which he did without first being confirmed by the emperor), Martin held a council at the Lateran in which the imperial documents were censured, and in which the patriarch of Constantinople and two of his predecessors were condemned. Constans II, in response, tried first to turn bishops and people against the pope.
Failing in this and in an attempt to kill the pope, the emperor sent troops to Rome to seize Martin and to bring him back to Constantinople. Martin, already in poor health, offered no resistance, returned with the exarch Calliopas and was then submitted to various imprisonments, tortures and hardships. Although condemned to death and with some of the torture imposed already carried out, Martin was saved from execution by the pleas of a repentant Paul, patriarch of Constantinople, who himself was gravely ill.
Martin died shortly thereafter, tortures and cruel treatment having taken their toll. He is the last of the early popes to be venerated as a martyr.

Comment:  The real significance of the word martyr comes not from the dying but from the witnessing, which the word means in its derivation. People who are willing to give up everything, their most precious possessions, their very lives, put a supreme value on the cause or belief for which they sacrifice. Martyrdom, dying for the faith, is an incidental extreme to which some have had to go to manifest their belief in Christ. A living faith, a life that exemplifies Christ's teaching throughout, and that in spite of difficulties, is required of all Christians. Martin might have temporized; he might have sought means to ease his lot, to make some accommodations with the civil rulers.

Quote:   The breviary of the Orthodox Church pays tribute to Martin: “Glorious definer of the Orthodox Faith...sacred chief of divine dogmas, unstained by error...true reprover of heresy...foundation of bishops, pillar of the Orthodox faith, teacher of religion.... Thou didst adorn the divine see of Peter, and since from this divine Rock, thou didst immovably defend the Church, so now thou art glorified with him.”

Martin I lay too sick to fight on a couch in front of the altar when the soldiers burst into the Lateran basilica. He had come to the church when he heard the soldiers had landed. But the thought of kidnapping a sick pope from the house of God didn't stop the soldiers from grabbing him and hustling him down to their ship.
Elected pope in 649, Martin I had gotten in trouble for refusing to condone silence in the face of wrong. At that time there existed a popular heresy that held that Christ didn't have a human will, only a divine will. The emperor had issued an edict that didn't support Monothelism (as it was known) directly, but simply commanded that no one could discuss Jesus' will at all.
Monothelism was condemned at a council convened by Martin I. The council affirmed, once again, that since Jesus had two natures, human and divine, he had two wills, human and divine. The council then went further and condemned Constans edict to avoid discussion stating, "The Lord commanded us to shun evil and do good, but not to reject the good with the evil."
In his anger at this slap in the face, the emperor sent his soldiers to Rome to bring the pope to him. When Martin I arrived in Constantinople after a long voyage he was immediately put into prison. There he spent three months in a filthy, freezing cell while he suffered from dysentery. He was not allowed to wash and given the most disgusting food. After he was condemned for treason without being allowed to speak in his defense he was imprisoned for another three months.
From there he was exiled to the Crimea where he suffered from the famine of the land as well as the roughness of the land and its people. But hardest to take was the fact that the pope found himself friendless. His letters tell how his own church had deserted him and his friends had forgotten him. They wouldn't even send him oil or corn to live off of.
He died two years later in exile in the year 656, a martyr who stood up for the right of the Church
to establish doctrine even in the face of imperial power.

Martin I, Pope M (RM) Born in Todi in Umbria, Italy; died in the Crimea, September 16, 655; feast day was previously November 12 (November 10 in York); the Eastern Church celebrates his feast on September 20.

Martin became a deacon in Rome. He displayed a great intellect and charity, was sent by Pope Theodore I as nuncio (apocrisiarius) to Constantinople, and was elected pope in 649 to succeed Theodore I. At once, he convened the council at the Lateran that condemned Monothelitism (the denial that Christ had a human will), the Typos--the edict of the reigning Emperor Constans II, which favored it, and Heraclius's Ekethesis. Although he was supported by the bishops of Africa, England, and Spain, the imperial wrath fell upon the pontiff who was arrested by Constans and taken to Constantinople in 653.

He had taken refuge in the Lateran, but the officers broke in to capture him. His own letters give an account of how his health broke down under the long voyage and a three-month imprisonment on the island of Naxos en rute. He writes:
"For forty-seven days, I have not been given water to wash in. I am frozen through and wasting away with dysentery. The food I get makes me vomit. But God sees all things and I trust in Him."

He was so ill when he arrived in Constantinople that he had to be carried to jail on a stretcher. He was tried for treason, although he was clearly being incarcerated for not accepting the Typos. He was condemned to death during his trial without being able to speak in his own defense. He was insulted publicly, flogged, and imprisoned. Intercession of dying Patriarch Paul of Constantinople saved his life, but he was exiled to Kherson in the Crimea.
From exile he wrote of the bad treatment he received and berated the Romans for forgetting him while he had prayed steadily for their faith to remain in tact. It is likely that he died of starvation. He was the last pope to die a martyr. He is portrayed in art vested as a pope, holding money (alms); or with geese around him (possibly a confusion with Saint Martin of Tours); or seen through prison bars (Attwater, Attwater2, Benedictines, Bentley, Delaney, Farmer, White).
838 Saint Guinoc Bishop of Scotland Guinoc's prayers helped king vanquish Picts B (AC)
(also known as Guinochus) Bishop Guinoc of Scotland is commemorated in the Aberdeen breviary and is especially venerated in Buchan. Some scholars believe that Guinoc was a counsellor to King Kenneth. It is said that Guinoc's prayers helped the king to vanquish the Picts in seven battles on a single day (Benedictines, Farmer, Husenbeth).

From the Lives of Saintes by Alban Butler
St. GUINOCH B. C. IN SCOTLAND.
 By his prayers and counsels, he was many years the support both of the church and state, among the Scots, in the ninth century, in the reign of Kenneth II., &c.  The Aberdeen breviary and Henschenius place him under king Enos.  He died about the year 838.
 See Major, 1.2, c. 14. Camerarius in Menologio Scotico, King, &c.
1113 Blessed Ida of Boulogne descendent of Blessed Charlemagne Benedictine oblate Widow (AC)
Ida, daughter of Duke Godfrey IV (Dode) of Lorraine, was a descendent of Blessed Charlemagne. At age 17, she became the wife of Count Eustace II of Boulogne. She was the mother of Godfrey and Baldwin de Bouillon. After her husband's death, Ida endowed several monasteries in Picardy, and became a Benedictine oblate under the obedience of the abbot of Saint Vaast (Attwater2, Benedictines, Encyclopedia, Gill).
1113 BD IDA OF BOULOGNE, Widow
IDA of Boulogne may well be called a daughter and a mother of kings, for both her parents were descended from Charlemagne, two of her sons, Godfrey and Baldwin, became kings of Jerusalem, and her granddaughter Matilda was, destined to be queen consort of England. Ida herself was the child of Godfrey IV, Duke of Lorraine, by his first wife Doda, and at the age of seventeen she was given in marriage to Eustace II, Count of’ Boulogne. Their union seems to have been a happy one, and Countess Ida regarded it as her paramount duty to train her children in the paths of holiness and to set them the example of liberal almsgiving to the poor. She had the good fortune to have as her spiritual adviser one of the greatest men of the age, St Anselm, abbot of Bec in Normandy, afterwards archbishop of Canterbury, some of whose letters to Ida have been preserved in his correspondence. The death of Count Eustace left his widow the control of valuable property, much of which she expended in the relief of the needy and in the construction of monasteries. Thus she founded Saint-Wulmer at Boulogne and Vasconvilliers, restored Samer and Our Lady of the Chapel, Calais, besides bestowing generous benefactions upon Saint-Bertin, Bouillon and Afflighem.
Bd Ida gave herself ardently to prayer for the success of the First Crusade, and it is recorded that, while she was making intercession for the safety of her son Godfrey of Bouillon, it was revealed to her that he was at that very moment making his victorious entry into Jerusalem. Although as the years passed Ida retired more and more from the world (she had once visited England), she does not appear ever to have actually taken the veil. She died when she was over seventy, at the close of a long and painful illness, and was buried in the church of the monastery of St Vaast.
There are two short lives of Bd Ida printed in the Acta Sanctorum, April, vol. ii. The first is attributed to a monk of St Vaast, a contemporary, the other was compiled by the canon regular John Gielemans, at a much later date. The best popular account is that of F. Ducatel Vie de Ste Ide de Lorraine (1900).
1124 St. Caradoc Welsh hermit harpist
He served a local king in southern Wales before becoming a hermit at St. Cendydd Church in Gower, later taking up residence on Barry Island at St. Issels.
Forced into exile by Henry I's invasion of the re­gion, Caradoc went to Haroldston, where he occupied the cell of St. Ismael.

From Lives of Saintes by Alban Butler
SAINT CARADOC, PRIEST AND HERMIT.
HE was a Welsh nobleman, native of Brecknockshire, who after he had received a liberal education, enjoyed the confidence of Rees, or Resus, prince of South-Wales, and held an honorable place in his court.   The prince one day, on account of two greyhounds which were lost, fell into such a fury against Caradoc as to threat on his life.  Caradoc, from this disgrace and check, learned the inconstancy and uncertainty of worldly honors and the best founded hopes, and resolved to dedicate himself altogether to the service of the King of kings, whose promises can never fade, and whose rewards are eternal.   Upon the spot he made the sacrifice of himself to God, by a vow of perpetual contingency, and of embracing a religious life.   Repairing to Landaff, he received from the bishop the clerical tonsure, and for some time served God in the church of St. T'heliau. Being desirous of finding a closer solitude, he afterwards spent some years in a little hut, which he built himself; near an abandoned church of St. Kined, in the country in which he made his prayer.  The reputation of his sanctity filled the whole country, and the archbishop of Menevia, or St. David's, calling him to that town, promoted him to priestly orders.  The saint hence retired, with certain devout companions, to the isle of Ary.    Certain pirates from Norway, who often infested these coasts, carried them off prisoners, but, fearing the judgments of God, safely set them on shore again the next day.     However, the archbishop of Menevia assigned the saint another habitation in the monastery of St. Hismiael, commonly called Ysam, in the country of Ross, or Pembrokeshire.  Henry I, king of England, having subdued the southern Welsh, sent a colony of Flemings into the country of Ross, who drove the old Britons out of their possessions.  The saint and his monastery suffered much from the oppressions of these new inhabitants, especially of Richard Tankard, a powerful Englishman among them.  This nobleman was, after some time, struck by God with a dangerous illness, and having recourse to St. Caradoc, was, by his prayers, restored to his health.  From this time the saint and his monastery found him a benefactor and protector.  St Caradoc died on Low-Sunday, the 13th of April, in the year 1124, and was buried with great honor in the church of St. David's. We are assured that his tomb was illustrated by miracles, and his body was found whole and incorrupt several years after, when it was translated with great solemnity.   See his life, written by Giraldus Cambrensis, the famous bishop of St. David's, near his time extant in Capgrave; also William of Malmesbury, &c.
1292 BD JAMES OF CERTALDO, ABBOT he early developed a vocation to the religious life: devotion and austerity greatly edified all who came into contact with him
ALTHOUGH born at Certaldo near Florence, Bd James spent practically alt his life at Volterra, which his parents had made their home. He was in the habit of accompanying his father and mother to the church of St Clement and St Justus, served by Camaldolese monks, and he early developed a vocation to the religious life. In the year 1230 he was received into the order.
His devotion and austerity greatly edified all who came into contact with him, and so strongly affected his father that he resigned his property to his two remaining sons to enter the monastery, where he spent the last years of his life as a lay-brother. Bd James was placed in charge of the parish, where he discharged his duties with great wisdom, leading many souls into the paths of holiness. Twice he refused the post of abbot, and although he was obliged to accept office when elected for the third time, he resigned shortly afterwards to become once more parish priest. One of his brothers joined
the Knights of St John of Jerusalem, but left them after six months to begin again more humbly as a lay-brother at St Justus. Bd James survived this brother for ten years, dying in 1292.
See the Acta Sanctorum, April, vol. ii. There is also an Italian life, printed early in the seventeenth century by S. Razzi.
1300 Blessed Ida of Louvain  OSB Cist. V (PC)
Born in Louvain; Ida became a Cistercian at the convent of Rossendael (Vallis Rosarum-Rosenthal), near Malines. According to a somewhat dubious biography, she exhibited many amazing supernatural charisms. Her cultus still survives in Louvain and among the Cistercians (Attwater2, Benedictines).
1300? BD IDA OF LOUVAIN, VIRGIN
IT is curious that two saints, bearing the same not very common name and separated from each other by a considerable interval of time, should have died on the same day of the year; but in both cases the thirteenth day of April is definitely set down by their respective biographers as that of their departure from this world.
The account preserved of Bd Ida of Louvain is, it must be confessed, open to some suspicion, partly because we have no external corroboration of any of the incidents recorded, and partly because it abounds in marvels of a very astonishing character.

She was a maiden born of a well-to-do family in Louvain, and she is said to have been marked out from her earliest years by God’s special graces. Though she had much to suffer from her father and sisters, who did not approve of her devotional practices, her superabundant charity and extreme asceticism, she pursued her way of life unfalteringly, guided, as she believed, by the spirit of God. Among her observances was that of genuflecting or prostrating herself repeatedly before a picture of our Lady, reciting the Hail Mary at each genuflection, a form of salutation which she sometimes reiterated over 1000 times in one day.
Her devotion to the sacred Passion was ardent beyond belief and earned for her the gift of the stigmata in hands, feet and side, as well, it seems, as the marks of the crown of thorns. She strove to hide them, but finding that they could not altogether be concealed, she obtained by her prayers the withdrawal of the external signs, though the pain which accompanied them still continued.
Her love for the Blessed Eucharist was not less remarkable. More than once her biographer speaks of her having received communion miraculously, and it is noteworthy that the practice of communicating under-both kinds is represented as still surviving, apparently after 1250, in the neighbourhood of Louvain and Mechlin. On one occasion Ida is said, in her desire to possess our Lord, to have lowered the pyx in which the Blessed Sacrament was hanging above the altar and to have attempted, though without success, to open it.
All dates are sadly lacking in Bd Ida’s biography, and we do not know at what age she entered the Cistercian convent of Roosendael near Mechlin, nor how old she was when she died, nor whether the year 1300 assigned for her death is not the error of some transcriber. In her religious life she was remarkable for her ecstasies and miracles. She was seen radiant with heavenly light, she is said to have known the secrets of hearts, and a fragrant perfume was often perceived by those who came near her. There seems to be no doubt that her tomb became a place of pilgrimage after her death, though all traces of it appear to have been swept away by the Gueux in 1580.
The biography of Bd Ida which is printed in the Acta Sanctorum, April, vol. ii, purports to have been compiled from memoranda carefully recorded by her confessor, Hugh by name. It is an interesting document from the point of view of the student of mystical theology and in atmosphere certainly corresponds with what we find in many similar records of the thirteenth century. See also an article by C. Kolb in the Cistercienser Chronik, vol. v (1893), pp. 129—140.
1320 Blessed Margaret of Città di Castello born blind abandoned then adopted very holy favored with heavenly visions many miracles V (AC); also known as Margaret of Metola) Born in at Meldola (or Metola, diocese of S. Angelo), Umbria, Italy, in 1287; cultus approved in 1609.
1320 BD MARGARET OF CITTA-DI-CASTELLO, VIRGIN She set children little tasks which she helped them to perform; instructing them in their duty to God and to man, instilling into them her own great devotion to the sacred Childhood, and she taught them the psalms which, in spite of her blindness, she had learnt by heart at the convent:  where many remarkable miracles were wrought at her tomb
IT must have been about the year 1293 when some women of Città-di-Castello in Umbria, who had gone one day to pray in their parish church, found within a destitute blind child of about six or seven who had been abandoned there by her parents. The kind souls were filled with pity for the little waif, and, poor though they were, they took charge of her—first one family and then another sheltering and feeding her until she became practically the adopted child of the village. One and all declared that, far from being a burden, little Margaret brought a blessing upon those who befriended her. Some years later the nuns of a local convent offered her a home. The girl herself rejoiced at the prospect of living with religious, but her joy was short-lived. The community was lax and worldly: Margaret’s fervour was a tacit reproach to them, nor did she bring them the profit they had anticipated. Neglect was succeeded by petty persecution, and then by active calumny. Finally she was driven forth ignominiously to face the world once more.
However, her old friends rallied round her. One couple offered her a settled home, which became her permanent residence. At the age of fifteen Margaret received the habit of a tertiary from the Dominican fathers, who had lately established themselves in Citta-di-Castello, and thenceforth she lived a life entirely devoted to God. More than ever did God’s benediction rest upon her. She cured another tertiary of an affliction of the eyes which had baffled medical skill, and her mantle extinguished a fire which had broken out in her foster-parents’ house.
In her desire to show her gratitude to the people of Città-di-Castello she undertook to look after the children whilst their parents were at work. Her little school prospered wonderfully, for she understood children, being very simple herself. She set them little tasks which she helped them to perform; she instructed them in their duty to God and to man, instilling into them her own great devotion to the sacred Childhood, and she taught them the psalms which, in spite of her blindness, she had learnt by heart at the convent. We are told that when at prayer she was frequently raised a foot or more from the ground, remaining thus for a long time. Thus she lived, practically unknown outside her own neighbourhood, until the age of thirty-three, when she died amidst the friends who loved her, and was buried by their wish in the parish church, where many remarkable miracles were wrought at her tomb. The cultus of Bd Margaret was confirmed in 1609.
The principal document we possess concerning Bd Margaret is a sketch of her life, written in the fourteenth century, which has been printed in the Analecta Bollandiana, vol. xix (1900), pp. 21—36. See also the Acta Sanctorum, April, vol. ii, and Procter, Dominican Saints, pp. 90—93, as well as Ganay, Les Bienheureuses Dominicaines. It is probable that the Franciscan Ubertino di Casale in an enthusiastic tribute which he pays in his Arbor Vitae to a devout mystic of Città-di-Castello was referring to Bd Margaret. An interesting popular account of the beata by W. R. Bonniwell, The Story of Margaret of Metola, was published in America in 1952; it is based on a biography discovered by Fr Bonniwell and differs in some particulars from the account given above. Cf. Analecta Bollandiana, vol. lxx (1952), p. 456.

Margaret was born blind into a poor, mountain family, who were embittered by her affliction. When she was five years old, they made a pilgrimage to the tomb of a holy Franciscan at Castello to pray for a cure. The miracle failing, they abandoned their daughter in the church of Città-di-Castello and returned to their home.

Margaret was passed from family to family until she was adopted by a kindly peasant woman named Grigia, who had a large family of her own.
Margaret's natural sweetness and goodness soon made themselves felt, and she more than repaid the family for their kindness to her. She was an influence for good in any group of children. She stopped their quarrels, heard their catechism, told them stories, taught them Psalms and prayers. Busy neighbors were soon borrowing her to soothe a sick child or to establish peace in the house.
Her reputation for holiness was so great that a community of sisters in the town asked for her to become one of them. Margaret went happily to join them, but, unfortunately, there was little fervor in the house. The little girl who was so prayerful and penitential was a reproach to their lax lives, so Margaret returned to Grigia, who gladly welcomed her home.
Later, Margaret was received as a Dominican Tertiary and clothed with the religious habit. Grigia's home became the rendezvous site of troubled souls seeking Margaret's prayers. She said the Office of the Blessed Virgin and the entire Psalter by heart, and her prayers had the effect of restoring peace of mind to the troubled.
Denied earthly sight, Margaret was favored with heavenly visions. "Oh, if you only knew what I have in my heart!" she often said. The mysteries of the rosary, particularly the joyful mysteries, were so vivid to her that her whole person would light up when she described the scene. She was often in ecstasy, and, despite great joys and favors in prayer, she was often called upon to suffer desolation and interior trials of frightening sorts. The devil tormented her severely at times, but she triumphed over these sufferings.
A number of miracles were performed by Blessed Margaret. On one occasion, while she was praying in an upper room, Grigia's house caught fire, and she called to Margaret to come down. The blessed, however, called to her to throw her cloak on the flames. This she did, and the blaze died out. At another time, she cured a sister who was losing her eyesight.
Beloved by her adopted family and by her neighbors and friends, Margaret died at the early age of 33. From the time of her death, her tomb in the Dominican church was a place of pilgrimage. Her body, even to this day, is incorrupt.
After her death, the fathers received permission to have her heart opened. In it were three pearls, having holy figures carved upon them. They recalled the saying so often on the lips of Margaret: "If you only knew what I have in my heart!" (Attwater2, Benedictines, Dorcy).
In art, Margaret is pictured as a Dominican tertiary holding a cross, lily, and heart with two flames offered to the crucifix (Roeder).
1392 Blessed James of Certaldo parish priest 40 yrs OSB Cam. (AC)
Born at Certaldo, Italy; James Guidi, son of a knight of Volterra, joined the Camaldolese Benedictines at the abbey of Saints Clement and Justus in his hometown. He spent 40 of his 60 years there as parish priest of the abbey church. Twice he was offered and refused the abbacy. His example was so powerful that both his father and his brother also joined the abbey as lay brothers (Attwater2, Benedictines).
1642 Blessed Edward Catherick priest missionary 44 yrs English Martyr M (AC)
Born at Carlton, Yorkshire, England; died at York in 1642; beatified in 1929. Blessed Edward was educated for the priesthood at Douai. Upon his ordination, he returned to the mission fields of England, where he worked from 1635 until his execution (Benedictines).
1642 BB. JOHN LOCKWOOD AND EDMUND CATHERICK, MARTYRS
BOTH these noble martyrs were Yorkshiremen. Lockwood, who sometimes used his mother’s family name of Lassels, was born in 1561. He had studied at Douai and at Rome, and before his final apprehension had twice been arrested and imprisoned. After his first confinement he was banished in 1610, but returning to England he was again taken and this time condemned to death. He was, however, reprieved and kept in prison until he regained his liberty, we know not how. Resuming his apostolic labours, he was finally captured at the house of a Mrs Catesby, being then eighty-one years old.

Catherick was a much younger man, and when, after his studies at Douai, he came to the English mission about the year 1635 he was only thirty years of age. After seven years of labour he also fell into the hands of the pursuivants and was brought before Justice Dodsworth, a connection of his by marriage, who committed him to York Castle and afterwards very discreditably gave evidence against him founded on his own private knowledge. Both the prisoners were condemned to death for their priesthood. When they came to the scaffold at York, the elder, thinking he saw signs of some weakening in his companion, claimed in virtue of his years the privilege of suffering first, and Bd Edmund, thus encouraged, met his end with entire firmness. Some portion of their relics, secured by Mary Ward’s community, were conveyed to the convent of her institute at Augsburg, where they still remain. The body, or part of it, of Bd John Lockwood is at Downside.
See Challoner, MMP., pp. 411—416, and also Stanton’s Menology, pp. 155—157.

Blessed John Lockwood M (AC) Born at Sowerby, Yorkshire, England; died at York in 1642; beatified in 1929. During the persecution of Catholics in England, John Lockwood, alias Lascelles, studied for the priesthood in Rome. After his ordination in 1597, he worked covertly in England for 44 years until his arrest in 1642. He was 81 years old when he was hanged, drawn, and quartered for the treasonable crime of being a Catholic priest (Attwater2, Benedictines).


THE PSALTER OF THE BLESSED VIRGIN MARY PSALM 323

My soul hath fainted in thy ways, O Lady:
and unless thou didst have the greatest compassion on me, I should indeed have perished in my weakness.

My eyes have failed in thy contemplation: like a bottle in the frost my soul has been before thee.

According to thy goodness quicken thou me: and I shall not forget thy words, because to cling to thee is good.

By thy ruling the world goes on: which thou together with God hast founded from the beginning.

I am all thine, o Lady; save me: for thy praises were desirable to me in the time of my pilgrimage.

Let every spirit praise Our Lady

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.

Join us on CatholicVote.org. Be part of a new movement committed to using powerful media projects to create a Culture of Life. We can help shape the movement and have a voice in its future. Check it out at www.CatholicVote.org

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

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

680 Shiite saint Imam Hussein, grandson of Islam's Prophet Muhammad Known as Ashoura and observed by Shiites across the world, the 10th day of the lunar Muslim month of Muharram: the anniversary of the 7th century death in battle of one of Shiite Islam's most beloved saints.  Imam Hussein died in the 680 A.D. battle fought on the plains outside Karbala, a city in modern Iraq that's home to the saint's shrine.  The battle over a dispute about the leadership of the Muslim faith following Muhammad's death in 632 A.D. It is the defining event in Islam's split into Sunni and Shiite branches.  The occasion is the source of an enduring moral lesson. "He sacrificed his blood to teach us not to give in to corruption, coercion, or use of force and to seek honor and justice."  According to Shiite beliefs, Hussein and companions were denied water by enemies who controlled the nearby Euphrates.  Streets get partially covered with blood from slaughter of hundreds of cows and sheep. Volunteers cook the meat and feed it to the poor.  Hussein's martyrdom recounted through a rich body of prose, poetry and song remains an inspirational example of sacrifice to many Shiites, 10 percent of the world's estimated 1.3 billion Muslims.
Meeting of the Saints  walis (saints of Allah)
Great men covet to embrace martyrdom for a cause and principle.
So was the case with Hazrat Ali. He could have made a compromise with the evil forces of his time and, as a result, could have led a very comfortable, easy and luxurious life.  But he was not a person who would succumb to such temptations. His upbringing, his education and his training in the lap of the holy Prophet made him refuse such an offer.
Rabia Al-Basri (717–801 C.E.) She was first to set forth the doctrine of mystical love and who is widely considered to be the most important of the early Sufi poets. An elderly Shia pointed out that during his pre-Partition childhood it was quite common to find pictures and portraits of Shia icons in Imambaras across the country.
Shah Abdul Latif: The Exalted Sufi Master born 1690 in a Syed family; died 1754. In ancient times, Sindh housed the exemplary Indus Valley Civilisation with Moenjo Daro as its capital, and now, it is the land of a culture which evolved from the teachings of eminent Sufi saints. Pakistan is home to the mortal remains of many Sufi saints, the exalted among them being Shah Abdul Latif Bhittai, a practitioner of the real Islam, philosopher, poet, musicologist and preacher. He presented his teaching through poetry and music - both instruments sublime - and commands a very large following, not only among Muslims but also among Hindus and Christians. Sindh culture: The Shah is synonymous with Sindh. He is the very fountainhead of Sindh's culture. His message remains as fresh as that of any present day poet, and the people of Sindh find solace from his writings. He did indeed think for Sindh. One of his prayers, in exquisite Sindhi, translates thus: “Oh God, may ever You on Sindh bestow abundance rare! Beloved! All the world let share Thy grace, and fruitful be.”
Shia Ali al-Hadi, died 868 and son Hassan al-Askari 874. These saints are the 10th and 11th of Shia's 12 most revered Imams. Baba Farid Sufi 1398 miracle, Qutbuddin Bakhtiar Kaki renowned Muslim Sufi saint scholar miracles 569 A.H. [1173 C.E.] hermit gave to poor, Khwaja Moinuddin Chishti greatest mystic of his time born 533 Hijri (1138-39 A.D.), Hazrat Ghuas-e Azam, Hazrat Bu Ali Sharif, and Hazrat Nizamuddin Aulia Sufi Saint Hazrath Khwaja Syed Mohammed Badshah Quadri Chisty Yamani Quadeer (RA) 1236-1325 welcomed people of all faiths & all walks of life.
801 Rabi'a al-'Adawiyya Sufi One of the most famous Islamic mystics
(b. 717). This 8th century saint was an early Sufi who had a profound influence on later Sufis, who in turn deeply influenced the European mystical love and troubadour traditions.  Rabi'a was a woman of Basra, a seaport in southern Iraq.  She was born around 717 and died in 801 (185-186).  Her biographer, the great medieval poet Attar, tells us that she was "on fire with love and longing" and that men accepted her "as a second spotless Mary" (186).  She was, he continues, “an unquestioned authority to her contemporaries" (218).
Rabi'a began her ascetic life in a small desert cell near Basra, where she lost herself in prayer and went straight to God for teaching.  As far as is known, she never studied under any master or spiritual director.  She was one of the first of the Sufis to teach that Love alone was the guide on the mystic path (222).  A later Sufi taught that there were two classes of "true believers": one class sought a master as an intermediary between them and God -- unless they could see the footsteps of the Prophet on the path before them, they would not accept the path as valid.  The second class “...did not look before them for the footprint of any of God's creatures, for they had removed all thought of what He had created from their hearts, and concerned themselves solely with God. (218)
Rabi'a was of this second kind.  She felt no reverence even for the House of God in Mecca:  "It is the Lord of the house Whom I need; what have I to do with the house?" (219) One lovely spring morning a friend asked her to come outside to see the works of God.  She replied, "Come you inside that you may behold their Maker.  Contemplation of the Maker has turned me aside from what He has made" (219).  During an illness, a friend asked this woman if she desired anything.
"...[H]ow can you ask me such a question as 'What do I desire?'  I swear by the glory of God that for twelve years I have desired fresh dates, and you know that in Basra dates are plentiful, and I have not yet tasted them.  I am a servant (of God), and what has a servant to do with desire?" (162)
When a male friend once suggested she should pray for relief from a debilitating illness, she said,
"O Sufyan, do you not know Who it is that wills this suffering for me?  Is it not God Who wills it?  When you know this, why do you bid me ask for what is contrary to His will?  It is not  well to oppose one's Beloved." (221)
She was an ascetic.  It was her custom to pray all night, sleep briefly just before dawn, and then rise again just as dawn "tinged the sky with gold" (187).  She lived in celibacy and poverty, having renounced the world.  A friend visited her in old age and found that all she owned were a reed mat, screen, a pottery jug, and a bed of felt which doubled as her prayer-rug (186), for where she prayed all night, she also slept briefly in the pre-dawn chill.  Once her friends offered to get her a servant; she replied,
"I should be ashamed to ask for the things of this world from Him to Whom the world belongs, and how should I ask for them from those to whom it does not belong?"  (186-7)
A wealthy merchant once wanted to give her a purse of gold.  She refused it, saying that God, who sustains even those who dishonor Him, would surely sustain her, "whose soul is overflowing with love" for Him.  And she added an ethical concern as well:
"...How should I take the wealth of someone of whom I do not know whether he acquired it lawfully or not?" (187)
She taught that repentance was a gift from God because no one could repent unless God had already accepted him and given him this gift of repentance.  She taught that sinners must fear the punishment they deserved for their sins, but she also offered such sinners far more hope of Paradise than most other ascetics did.  For herself, she held to a higher ideal, worshipping God neither from fear of Hell nor from hope of Paradise, for she saw such self-interest as unworthy of God's servants; emotions like fear and hope were like veils -- i.e., hindrances to the vision of God Himself.  The story is told that once a number of Sufis saw her hurrying on her way with water in one hand and a burning torch in the other.  When they asked her to explain, she said:
"I am going to light a fire in Paradise and to pour water on to Hell, so that both veils may vanish altogether from before the pilgrims and their purpose may be sure..." (187-188)
She was once asked where she came from.  "From that other world," she said.  "And where are you going?" she was asked.  "To that other world," she replied (219).  She taught that the spirit originated with God in "that other world" and had to return to Him in the end.  Yet if the soul were sufficiently purified, even on earth, it could look upon God unveiled in all His glory and unite with him in love.  In this quest, logic and reason were powerless.  Instead, she speaks of the "eye" of her heart which alone could apprehend Him and His mysteries (220).
Above all, she was a lover, a bhakti, like one of Krishna’s Goptis in the Hindu tradition.  Her hours of prayer were not so much devoted to intercession as to communion with her Beloved.  Through this communion, she could discover His will for her.  Many of her prayers have come down to us:
       "I have made Thee the Companion of my heart,
        But my body is available for those who seek its company,
        And my body is friendly towards its guests,
        But the Beloved of my heart is the Guest of my soul."  [224]
To Save A Life is Earthly; Saving A Soul is Eternal Donation by mail, please send check or money order to:
Eternal Word Television Network 5817 Old Leeds Rd. Irondale, AL 35210  USA
  Catholic Television Network  Supported entirely by donations from viewers  help  spread the Eternal Word, online Here
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 Pasqualina 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, PSALTER  BLESSED VIRGIN MARY 323 2023