Mary the Mother of Jesus
    Friday Saints of  the Day 22 September  Nono Kaléndas Octóbris  
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!)
RDeo grátias. R.  Thanks be to God.
September is the month of Our Lady of Sorrows since 1857
2023
22,013  Lives Saved Since 2007

ABORTION IS A MORAL OUTRAGE

CAUSES OF SAINTS

Six to Be Canonized on Feast of Christ the King

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


We are the defenders of true freedom.
  May our witness unveil the deception of the "pro-choice" slogan.
40 days for Life Campaign saves lives Shawn Carney Campaign Director www.40daysforlife.com
Please help save the unborn they are the future for the world

It is a great poverty that a child must die so that you may live as you wish -- Mother Teresa
 Saving babies, healing moms and dads, 'The Gospel of Life'

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

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" (Psalm 21:28)
  September 22
 300 St. Phocas martyred gardener from Sinope, Paphlagonia  Black Sea
Expecting to find Roman architecture from the 2nd century, archaeologists instead discovered the remains of a Christian church from the 4th century, an extremely early find, given that Christianity had only just emerged as a tolerated religion at that date.  After working on the project for more than eleven years, Hill is amazed at how the research has come together in its latter stages: “It was only towards the end of the excavation process and into the post-excavation analysis that the complexity of the successive problems became apparent – so the whole story unfolded somewhat like a detective story.”

  259 St. Digna & Emerita Roman maidens martyred in the Eternal City
 287 St. Maurice was an officer of the Theban Legion
3rd v. St. Jonas martyred  Companion of St. Denis of Paris
 300 St. Phocas martyred gardener from Sinope, Paphlagonia  Black Sea
 287  Marytrs of the Theban Legion members of a Roman legion
3rd v. blessed Sanctinus, bishop, a disciple of St. Denis the Areopagite
  300 St. Irais, priests, deacons, virgins, and all others martyred for the faith
4th v. St. Sylvanus, confessor lived in time of St Cyril
5th v.St. Florentius Hermit and disciple of St. Martin of Tours
 530 ST FELIX III (IV), POPE revered in his day as a man of great simplicity, humility and kindness to the poor.
 568 St. Lauto Bishop of Constance in Normandy
 665 St. Salaberga (Sadalberga) Abbess and founder cured of blindness
 690 St. Emmeramus Benedictine Bishop martyr native of Poitiers
 781 St. Lioba Benedictine abbess relative of St. Boniface
9th v. St. Lanto, bishop In the territory of Coutances
1034 St. Lolanus Scottish bishop
1555 St. Thomas of Villanueva Augustinian bishop from Fuentellana, Castile Spain; Many examples recorded of supernatural gifts, such as power of healing sick,  multiplying food, numerous miracles attributed to his intercession before and after death;  called in his lifetime “the pattern of bishops” “the almsgiver the father of the poor”
1637 St. Lawrence Ruiz and Companions; Lorenzo: "That I will never do, because I am a Christian, and I shall die for God, and for him I will give many thousands of lives if I had them. And so, do with me as you please."

Saint Mary of the Royal Court (Italy, 1575)
It's Always the Time of Miracles
A fact, true and wonderful, which thousands of people can attest and certify even today, is the apparition of the Blessed Virgin on September 19, 1846. This loving Mother showed herself as a beautiful Lady to two children. (...)
She appeared to them on a mountain in the Alps. (...) for the sake of France, (...) and of the whole world. 
All this to warn them that the wrath of her divine Son was ablaze against men, especially on account of three sins:

blasphemy, the profanation of Sunday and holy days, and the transgression of the laws of abstinence.
Prodigious facts have come to confirm this apparition, found in public records or attested by people whose sincerity and faith rule out any doubt. These facts are precious to confirm the good in their attachment to religion and to refute those who, perhaps out of ignorance, wish to set a limit to the power and mercy of God by saying that the time of miracles is over.

Saint John Bosco, Turin, 1875.  Apparition of the Blessed Virgin at La Salette. 
November 22 – Virgin of Quinche (Equador)
Living the revolution of tenderness, like Mary -- Pope Francis Santiago de Cuba, September 22, 2015
 We are asked to live the revolution of tenderness as Mary, our Mother of Charity, did. We are invited to “leave home” and to open our eyes and hearts to others.  Our revolution comes about through tenderness, through the joy which always becomes closeness and compassion…and leads us to get involved in, and to serve, the life of others.

Our faith makes us leave our homes and go forth to encounter others, to share their joys, their hopes and their frustrations.
Our faith, “calls us out of our house,” to visit the sick, the prisoner and to those who mourn.
It makes us able to laugh with those who laugh, and rejoice with our neighbors who rejoice.

Like Mary, we want to be a Church which serves, which leaves home and goes forth, which goes forth from its chapels, forth from its sacristies, in order to accompany life, to sustain hope, to be the sign of unity of a noble and worthy people.
Like Mary, Mother of Charity, we want to be a Church which goes forth to build bridges, to break down walls, to sow seeds of reconciliation.
Like Mary, we want to be a Church which can accompany all those “pregnant” situations of our people, committed to life, to culture, to society, not washing our hands but rather walking together with our brothers and sisters.

Pope Francis
Excerpt from Homily in the Minor Basilica of the Shrine “Virgen de la Caridad del Cobre,” Santiago de Cuba, September 22, 2015

September 22 - OUR LADY OF COMPASSION (France, 6th Century).
When One Thinks of Mary, God Becomes Concrete
When one thinks of Mary, Mother of God, God becomes concrete, alive, present, living among us, incredibly close and accessible. Through this woman, God's incarnation, the Cross, the forgiveness of sins, hope in eternal Life for you and for me, all becomes plausible and desirable. Without her, Christianity becomes cloudy, theoretical, hypothetical, odorless, moralizer, maybe improbable, or at least not very attractive.
She brings to the whole story the royal seal of authenticity and of the kept word.  
She is all in God by election and grace; she remains completely from our world by her nature and her race, by her inalienable odor of a girl who is one of us.

R. P. Bruckberger Mary, Mother of Jesus Christ, Ed Albin Michel


3rd v. St. Jonas martyred  Companion of St. Denis of Paris
Apud pagum Castrénsium sancti Jonæ, Presbyteri et Mártyris; qui, cum sancto Dionysio proféctus in Gálliam, ibídem, Juliáni Præfécti jussu verbéribus cæsus, gládio martyrium consummávit.
    At Arpajon, near Paris, St. Jonas, priest and martyr, who went to France along with St. Denis.  After he was scourged by the order of the prefect Julian, his martyrdom was ended by the sword.
sometimes listed as Yon. He was martyred in Paris.
259 St. Digna & Emerita Roman maidens martyred in the Eternal City
Romæ pássio sanctárum Vírginum et Mártyrum Dignæ et Eméritæ, sub Valeriáno et Gallieno; quarum relíquiæ in Ecclésia sancti Marcélli asservántur.
    At Rome, the martyrdom of the holy virgins and martyrs Digna and Emerita, under Valerian and Gallienus.  Their relics are kept in the church of St. Marcellus.
They both died while praying before their judges. Their relics are in St. Marcellus Church in Rome.
287 St. Maurice was an officer of the Theban Legion
Sedúni, in Gállia, in loco Agáuno, natális sanctórum Mártyrum Thebæórum Maurítii, Exsupérii, Cándidi, Victóris, Innocéntii et Vitális, cum Sóciis ejúsdem legiónis; qui, sub Maximiáno, pro Christo necáti, gloriósa passióne mundum illustrárunt.
    At St. Maurice, near Sion in Switzerland, the birthday of the holy Theban martyrs Maurice, Exuperius, Candidus, Victor, Innocent, and Vitalis, with their companions of the same legion, whose martyrdom for the faith during the time of Maximian filled the world with the glory of their sufferings.
of Emperor Maximian Herculius' army, which was composed of Christians from Upper Egypt. He and his fellow legionnaires refused to sacrifice to the gods as ordered by the Emperor to insure victory over rebelling Bagaudae. When they refused to obey repeated orders to do so and withdrew from the army encamped at Octodurum (Martigny) near Lake Geneva to Agaunum (St. Maurice-en-Valais), Maximian had a decimation first and then the entire Legion of over six thousand men put to death.? To the end they were encouraged in their constancy by Maurice and two fellow officers, Exuperius and Candidus. Also executed was Victor (October 10th), who refused to accept any of the belongings of the dead soldiers. In a follow-up action, other Christians put to death were Ursus and another Victor at Solothurin (September 30th); Alexander at Bergamo; Octavius, Innocent, Adventor, and Solutar at Turin; and Gereon (October 10th) at Cologne. Their story was told by St. Eucherius, who became Bishop of Lyons about 434, but scholars doubt that an entire Legion was massacred; but there is no doubt that Maurice and some of his comrades did suffer martyrdom at Agaunum.

veteran named Victor refused to join in. At this the soldiers inquired if he was also a Christian. He answered that he was, upon which they fell upon him and slew him. Ursus and another Victor, two straggling soldiers of this legion, were found at Solothurn and there killed, and according to local legends many others elsewhere, such as St Alexander at Bergamo, SS. Octavius, Adventor and Solutor at Turin, and St Gereon at Cologne. The Roman Martyrology mentions Vitalis and Innocent, as well as the above three and Victor, today, 55. Ursus and Victor on September 30, and St Antoninus at Piacenza, wrongly associated with the Theban Legion, on the same date. St Eucherius, speaking of their relics preserved at Agaunum in his time, says, “Many come from divers provinces devoutly to honour these saints, and offer presents of gold, silver and other things. I humbly present this monument of my pen, begging intercession for the pardon of my sins, and the perpetual protection of my patrons.” He mentions many miracles to have been performed at their shrine and says of a certain woman who had been cured of a palsy by them “ Now she carries her own miracle about with her.”

This St Eucherius is the principal witness for the story which has just been related. He was bishop of Lyons during the first half of the fifth century, and wrote down for a Bishop Salvius an account of these martyrs of Agaunum, in whose honour a basilica had been built there towards the end of the previous century, in consequence of a vision of their place of burial vouchsafed to the then bishop of Octodurum, Theodore. Eucherius says he had the story from informants of Isaac, Bishop of Geneva, who, Eucherius thought, was told it by Theodore. It will be noticed that, as related above, the legionaries in their manifesto speak of refusing to spill the blood of innocent Christians. This protest was doubtless composed by St Eucherius himself, who states that they were killed for refusing to undertake the massacre of Christians and does not mention the revolting Bagaudae; other accounts of the martyrs say they suffered for not sacrificing. St Maurice and his companions have been the subject of much discussion. That a whole legion was put to death is highly improbable Roman imperial generals were not incapable of such a wholesale slaughter, but the circumstances of the time and the lack of early evidence of an entirely satisfactory sort are all against it. Alban Butler notes with pain that “ the truth of this history is attacked by some Protestant historians “, but it has been questioned by Catholic scholars as well, and some have even gone so far as to reject the whole of it as a fabrication. But it seems clear that the martyrdom at Agaunum of St Maurice and his companions is an historical fact what was the number of men involved is another matter in the course of time a squad could easily be exaggerated into a legion.

The church built at Agaunum by St Theodore of Octodurum later became the centre of an abbey, which was the first in the West to maintain the Divine Office continually by day and by night by means of a cycle of choirs. This monastery came into the hands of the canons regular, and is now an abbey-nullius. Relics of the martyrs are preserved here in a sixth-century reliquary, but veneration of the Theban Legion has spread with other relics far beyond the borders of Switzer­land. They are commemorated in the liturgy of the whole Western church, and St Maurice is patron of Savoy and Sardinia and of several towns, as well as of infantry soldiers, sword-smiths, and weavers and dyers.

MGH., Scriptores Merov., vol. iii, pp. 32—41, is of first importance. On the whole question of the martyrdom the volume of M. Bessoo, Monasterium Acaunense (1913), is perhaps the most sober and reliable. He dissents from the extreme views of Krusch, though he is in some matters himself open to criticism (cf. the Analecta Bollandiana, vol. xxxiii, pp. 243-245). The subject is also treated at great length by H. Leclercq in DAC, vol. x (1932), cc. 2699-2729. The bibliography which he supplies extends to four closely-printed columns, and shows impressively the ioterest which the controversy has excited. See 0. Lauterburg and R. Marti-Wehren, Martyrium von sankt Mauritiur Die Legende (1945).

300 St. Irais, priests, deacons, virgins, and all others martyred for the faith
Antinoópoli, in Ægypto, sanctæ Iráidis, Vírginis Alexandrínæ, et Sociórum Mártyrum.  Ipsa Virgo, cum esset ad hauriéndam e próximo fonte aquam egréssa, et navim vidísset Confessóribus Christi onústam, prótinus, relícta hydria, se illis adjúnxit, ac, simul cum iis in urbem ducta, prima ómnium, post multa supplícia, cápite cæsa est; deínde Presbyteri, Diáconi, et Vírgines, aliíque omnes eódem mortis génere consúmpti sunt.
    At Antinopolis in Egypt, the holy martyrs Irais, an Alexandrian virgin, and her companions.  Having gone out to draw water at a near-by fountain, and seeing a boat loaded with Christian confessors, she immediately left her vessel and joined them.  She was conducted to the city with them, and after many torments she was the first to have her head struck off.  After her, priests, deacons, virgins, and all others underwent the same kind of death.
Also Rhais, an Egyptian martyr. She was put to death at Alexandria or at Antinoe, Egypt, during the persecutions of Emperor Diocletian
.
300 St. Phocas martyred gardener from Sinope, Paphlagonia  Black Sea
performed his duties with care and purpose; gave food and lodging to any to any stranger in need; lived as an anchorite pursuing prayer and contemplation; suffered martyrdom for being a Christian; beheaded by soldiers who were given orders to look for Phocas in order to try him for his faith; inadvertently, the soldiers stayed at Phocas when they asked him for a place to sleep; when they told Phocas their mission and asked his whereabouts, he prepared himself for death by digging his own grave; in the morning, he admitted to the soldiers that he himself was Phocas and calmly faced his death. Gardener by trade, Phocas led a life of simplicity, oneness with nature, and a purity recalling God's creation of the first human gardeners, Adam and Eve

THE STORY OF a unique archaeological find, dubbed 'the unluckiest church in the world', has been pieced together by an archaeologist at the University of Warwick. Intriguing fragments of mosaic began washing ashore on the Black Sea coast in the early 1990s, and were brought to the attention of the museum at Sinop in Turkey. The source of the fragments was discovered to be at the edge of a cliff top, where Dr Stephen Hill began work on a project to halt the erosion that threatened to destroy the site. 

Hill and his team soon found themselves, however, embroiled in something more complex than the rescue mission they had embarked upon. Expecting to find Roman architecture from the 2nd century, the archaeologists instead discovered the remains of a Christian church from the 4th century, an extremely early find, given that Christianity had only just emerged as a tolerated religion at that date.  After working on the project for more than eleven years, Hill is amazed at how the research has come together in its latter stages: “It was only towards the end of the excavation process and into the post-excavation analysis that the complexity of the successive problems became apparent – so the whole story unfolded somewhat like a detective story.”
One of the most surprising revelations was the discovery of a baptismal font. Fonts served a specific purpose for the Christian community, and to find one in such a remote location posed an absorbing question. The worshippers at this secluded church would most likely have been monks, already baptised and with no need of a font – so why was one built there?
Researchers believe the answer may be connected to the story of Phocas, patron saint of gardeners and mariners.
Popular stories of this man tend to concentrate on the peculiar, not to say lurid, circumstances of his death.

Legend has it that Phocas led a simple life in obedience to God, some time in the third or fourth century. He spent his days helping those in need, growing flowers in his garden and praying – all of which, apparently, did little to endear him to the Roman authorities, who ordered his assassination as part of their persecution of Christians. Two soldiers were dispatched for Sinop on the Black sea coast with instructions to kill Phocas on sight.  However, the executioners had trouble finding anywhere to stay as night fell, and without knowing it they turned up outside their victim's residence. As befitted his character, Phocas offered them shelter and food for the night, but over supper learned of his killers' intentions. Without revealing himself, he offered to show them the way to their target in the morning.  Once they had gone to sleep, Phocas went into his garden and dug a grave for himself, before spending the rest of the night in prayer. When the soldiers arose the next day, their host told them that Phocas was now at their disposal, and revealed his true identity to them.
The would-be assassins were thrown into turmoil, appalled by the thought that they must kill the man who had shown them such kindness. Phocas himself resolved their dilemma, by explaining that to die for his faith would be the highest honour. He entreated them to carry out their duties, which they eventually did. The kindly gardener was beheaded and buried in the grave of his own making.

A cult surrounding the martyrdom of St Phocas grew up, and his grave may have become a place of pilgrimage. If so, then the church built in his memory was probably built on the site of his death, and designed to accommodate the needs of these early pilgrims. One of these needs was baptism, hence the font. Analysis of the archaeological findings by Hill and his team has revealed that the troubles of Phocas's putative church bear comparison with those of the man himself. It appears that the church would originally have been situated in a valley floor, subject to melt-water flooding and landslides, and an unwise place to build at all.
Before its completion in the fourth century, an earthquake struck the region and severely damaged much of the church's structure. A whole section of the new building was abandoned, with the builders sealing up the doors and windows and reinforcing the remaining walls.  The setbacks continued. The intricate floor mosaic, which first alerted archaeologists to the site, was completed by the builders but subsequently abandoned when a flood deposited a thick layer of sediment over it. Then as the main part of the church was being fitted with decorative sculptures and embellishments, a second earthquake hit. Archaeological evidence for this comes from the remains of the sculptures, which would have been fitted to the building before being finely carved on site.
The unfinished works of art mark the abandonment of attempts to ever complete the church as a place of worship.

The remaining part of the church was subsequently used as a pottery, although it was later subject to another landslide. The porch of the church survived for some time, and appears to have been used by opium smokers, who left behind poppy seeds and part of a pipe some time in the middle ages.

The site now lies at the very edge of a cliff overlooking the Black Sea, which has already claimed chunks of the precious mosaic. Hill reports that sea defences he has applied appear to have reversed the erosion, and the sea is now depositing material to protect the cliff, but Turkey's seismological disturbances present another threat to the site – and a quandary for archaeologists.
To dig or not to dig? Further parts of the structure currently lie under a thick deposit of topsoil, which acts as good protection from future earthquakes in the region. Hill is concerned that investigating this area could place it in greater jeopardy, as large cracks have recently appeared in the uncovered mosaic. Utter annihilation could prove the final ignominy for this most unfortunate of churches.  Funding for the project has come from the British Institute of Archaeology in Ankara, and Dr Hill is now seeking further support to continue his work. He can be contacted by e-mail: Stephen.Hill@warwick.ac.uk

ST PHOCAS THE GARDENER, MARTYR
ST PHOCAS dwelt near the gate of Sinope, a city of Paphlagonia on the Black Sea, and lived by cultivating a garden. In his humble profession he imitated the virtue of the most holy anchorites, and seemed in part restored to the happy condition of our first parents in Eden. To prune the garden without labour and toil was their sweet employment and pleasure. Since their sin, the earth yields not its fruit but by the sweat of our brow. But still, no labour is more useful or necessary or more natural to man, and better adapted to maintain in him vigour of mind and health of body, than that of tillage; nor does any other part of the universe rival the charms which a garden presents to our senses, by the fragrance of its flowers and the sweetness and variety of its fruits; by the melody of its musicians, by the worlds of wonders which every stem, leaf, and fibre exhibit to the attention of the inquisitive philosopher, and by that beauty and variegated lustre of colours which clothe the numberless tribes of its smallest inhabitants and adorn its shining landscapes, vying with the brightest splendour of the heavens and in a single lily surpassing the lustre with which Solomon was surrounded on his throne in the midst of all his glory. And what a field for contemplation does a garden offer to our view, raising our souls to God in love and praise, stimulating us to fervour by the fruitfulness with which it repays our labour and multiplies the seed it receives, and exciting us to tears of compunction for our insensibility to God by the barrenness with which it is changed into a desert unless subdued by ceaseless toil. St Phocas, joining prayer with his labour, found in his garden an instructive book and an inexhaustible fund of meditation. His house was open to strangers and travellers who had no lodging in the place and after having for many years liberally be­stow-ed the fruit of his labour on the poor, he was found worthy also to give his life for Christ.

When a cruel persecution was suddenly raised against the Church, Phocas was impeached as a Christian, the formality of a trial was dispensed with, and soldiers were dispatched with an order to kill him wherever they should find him. Arriving near Sinope, they could not enter the town, but stopping at his house without knowing it, at his invitation they took up their lodging with him. They at supper disclosed to him the errand upon which they were sent, and desired him to inform them ‘where this Phocas could be found. He told them he was well acquainted with the man, and would give them news of him next morning. After they had retired to bed he dug a grave, prepared everything for his burial, and spent the night in disposing his soul for his last hour. When it was day he went to his guests, and told them Phocas was found and in their power whenever they pleased to apprehend him. They inquired where he was. He is here, said the martyr. “I myself am the man.” Struck by his undaunted resolution and composure they did not at first know what to do with this man who had so generously entertained them he, seeing their trouble, told them that he looked upon such a death as the greatest of favours and his highest advantage. At length, recovering from their surprise and scruples, they struck off his head. The Christians of that city after­wards built a stately church which bore his name. St Asterius, Bishop of Amasea, about the year 400 pronounced the panegyric of this martyr on his festival in a church which possessed a small part of his relics, and said that Phocas from the time of his death has become a pillar and support of the churches on earth. He draws all men to his house ; the highways are filled with persons resorting from every country to this place of prayer. The magnificent church which is possessed of his body is the comfort and ease of the afflicted, the health of the sick, the store­house plentifully supplying the wants of the poor. If in any other place, as in this, some small portion of his relics be found, it also becomes admirable and most desired by Christians.” He adds that the sailors in the Euxine, Aegean and Adriatic seas, and in the ocean, sing hymns in his honour, and that the martyr has often succored and preserved them.

Alban Butler’s account of St Phocas has been set out above, with some verbal alterations and omissions, because it will touch the heart of all gardeners. But it must be added that all that can be safely said of Phocas of Sinope is that he lived, was martyred, and was widely venerated. Much false and allusive matter has accrued to his story, and the name Phocas figures in calendars on various dates. In the Roman Martyrology St Phocas, martyr at Antioch on March 5, and St Phocas, Bishop of Sinope and martyr under Trajan, on July 14, are probably both derivatives of Phocas the Gardener. His relics, or parts of them, were claimed by Antioch, Vienne in France and other places

The panegyric of St Asterius is printed in the Acta Sanctorum, September, vol. vi, and in Migne, PG., vol. xl, cc. 300—313St Phocas has been much discussed by students of folklore anxious to elucidate his popularity with sea-faring people the explanation is perhaps to be found in the resemblance of his name to the word  meaning a seal. See Radermacher in Archivf. Religionswissenschaft, vol. vii (1904), pp. 445—452. On the other hand E. Maas, 0. Kern, and Jaisle suggest quite untenable solutions. St Phocas has a full notice in the Synaxarium Goustantinopolitanum (ed. Delehaye), cc. 67—68, under Sep­tember 22; and see CMH, pp. 128, 374—375.
Marytrs of the Theban Legion members of a Roman legion
Sedúni, in Gállia, in loco Agáuno, natális sanctórum Mártyrum Thebæórum Maurítii, Exsupérii, Cándidi, Victóris, Innocéntii et Vitális, cum Sóciis ejúsdem legiónis; qui, sub Maximiáno, pro Christo necáti, gloriósa passióne mundum illustrárunt.
    At St. Maurice, near Sion in Switzerland, the birthday of the holy Theban martyrs Maurice, Exuperius, Candidus, Victor, Innocent, and Vitalis, with their companions of the same legion, whose martyrdom for the faith during the time of Maximian filled the world with the glory of their sufferings.
composed largely of Egyptians and serving in the army of co-Emperor Maximian, colleague of the famed hater of Christians, Emperor Diocletian. While serving in France, the legion marched to Agaunum, where it encamped for pagan rituals. Maurice, a commander, and Exuperius, Candidus, Innocent, Vitalis, two Victors, and the men of the legion refused to worship pagan deities, or possibly refused to massacre the local innocent populace. They were supposed to be pressured to obey by witnessing the beheading of some of their officers, but refused to offer sacrifices to the Roman gods. Reportedly, Maximian brought in another legion to slay the 6,600 Christians. A basilica, St. Maurice-en-Valais, was built from about 369-391 to commemorate this remarkable martyrdom. This cult is now confined to local calendars.

SS. MAURICE AND HIS COMPANIONS, MARTYRS OF THE THEBAN LEGION     (c. A.D. 287?)

A NUMBER of the Gauls, called Bagaudae, having risen in revolt, the Augustus Maximian Herculius marched against them with an army, of which one unit was the Theban Legion. This had been recruited in Upper Egypt and was composed entirely of Christians. When he arrived at Octodurum (Martigny), on the Rhone above the lake of Geneva, Maximian issued an order that the whole army should join in offering sacrifice to the gods for the success of their expedition. The Theban Legion hereupon withdrew itself, encamped near Agaunum (now called St Maurice­en-Valais), and refused to take any part in these rites. Maximian repeatedly commanded them to obey orders, and upon their constant and unanimous refusal sentenced them to be decimated. Thus every tenth man was put to death, according as the lot fell. After the first decimation, a second was commanded, unless the soldiers obeyed the orders given; but they cried out that they would rather suffer all penalties than do anything contrary to their religion. They were principally encouraged by three of their officers, Maurice, Exuperius and Candidus, referred to respectively as the primicerius, the campiductor and the senator militum. Maximian warned the remainder that it was of no use for them to trust to their numbers, for if they persisted in their disobedience not a man among them should escape death. The legion answered him by a respectful remonstrance We are your soldiers, but are also servants of the true God. We owe you military service and obedience; but we cannot renounce Him who is our Creator and Master, and also yours even though you reject Him. In all things which are not against His law we most willingly obey you, as we have done hitherto. We readily oppose all your enemies, whoever they are; but we cannot dip our hands into the blood of innocent persons. We have taken an oath to God before we took one to you: you can place no confidence in our second oath if we violate the first. You command us to punish the Christians; behold, we are such. We confess God the Father, author of all things, and His Son, Jesus Christ. We have seen our com­panions slain without lamenting them, and we rejoice at their honour. Neither this nor any other provocation has tempted us to revolt. We have arms in our hands, but we do not resist because we would rather die innocent than live by any sin.”

This legion consisted of about six thousand six hundred men, and Maximian, having no hopes of overcoming their constancy, commanded the rest of his army to surround them and cut them to pieces. They made no resistance but suffered themselves to be butchered like sheep, so that the ground was covered with their dead bodies, and streams of blood flowed on every side. Maximian gave the spoils of the slain to his soldiers for their booty, and they were sharing it out when a veteran named Victor refused to join in. At this the soldiers inquired if he was also a Christian. He answered that he was upon which they fell upon him and slew him.

Ursus and another Victor two straggling soldiers of this legion were found at Solothurn and there killed and according to local legends many others elsewhere    such as St Alexander at Bergamo SS. Octavius Adventor and Solutor at Turin and St Gereon at Cologne. The Roman Martyrology mentions Vitalis and Innocent as well as the above three and Victor today SS. Ursus and Victor on September 30and St .ABtoninus at Piacenza wrongly associated with the Theban Legion on the same date. St Eucherius speaking of their relics preserved at Agaunum in his time says Many come from divers provinces devoutly to honour these saints and offer presents of gold silver and other things. I humbly present this monument of my pen begging intercession for the pardon of my sins and the perpetual protection of my patrons.” He mentions many miracles to have been performed at their shrine and says of a certain woman who had been cured of a palsy by them: “Now she carries her own miracle about with her.”  This St Eucherius is the principal witness for the story which has just been related. He was bishop of Lyons during the first half of the fifth century and wrote down for a Bishop Salvius an account of these martyrs of Agaunum  in whose  honour a basilica had been built there towards the end of the previous century in consequence of a vision of their place of burial vouchsafed to the then bishop of Octodurum Theodore. Eucherius says he had the story from informants of Isaac Bishop of Geneva who Eucherius thought was told it by Theodore. It will be noticed that as related above the legionaries in their manifesto speak of refusing to spill the blood of innocent Christians. This protest was doubtless composed by St Eucherius himself who states that they were killed for refusing to undertake the massacre of Christians and does not mention the revolting Bagaudae; other accounts of the martyrs say they suffered for not sacrificing.
St Maurice and his companions have been the subject of much discussion. That a whole legion was put to death is highly improbable; Roman imperial generals were not incapable of such a wholesale slaughter but the circumstances of the time and the lack of early evidence of an entirely satisfactory sort are all against it. Alban Butler notes with pain that the truth of this history is attacked by some Protestant  historians but it has been questioned by Catholic scholars as well and some have even gone so far as tq reject the whole of it as a fabrication. But it seems clear that the martyrdom at Agaunum of St Maurice and his companions is an historical fact: what was the number of men involved is another matter; in the course of time a squad could easily be exaggerated into a legion.
    The church built at Agaunum by St Theodore of Octodurum later became the centre of an abbey which was the first in the West to maintain the Divine Office continually by day and by night by means of a cycle of choirs. This monastery came into the hands of the canons regular and is now an abbey-nullius. Relics of the martyrs are preserved here in a sixth-century reliquary but veneration of the Theban Legion has spread with other relics far beyond the borders of Switzerland. They are commemorated in the liturgy of the whole Western church and St Maurice is patron of Savoy and Sardinia and of several towns as well as of infantry soldiers. sword-smiths and weavers and dyers.       

The text of St Eucherius which has suffered many interpolations will be found in Ruinart, and in the Acta Sanctorum, September, vol. vi; but the critical edition by B. Krusch in MGH., Sriptores Merov., vol. iii, pp. 3241, is of first importance. On the whole question of the martyrdom the volume of M. Besson, Monasterium Acaunense (1913), is perhaps the  most sober and reliable. He dissents from the extreme views of Krusch, though he is in some matters himself open to criticism (Cf. the Analecta Bollandiana, vol. xxxiii, pp. 243245).  The subject is also treated at great length by H. Leclercq in DAC., vol. X (1932), cc. 2699—2729. The bibliography which he supplies extends to four closely-printed columns, and shows impressively the interest which the controversy has excited. See also 0. Lauterburg and R. Marti-Wehren, Martyrium von sankt Mauritius...Die Legende 1945.

3rd v. blessed Sanctinus, bishop, a disciple of St. Denis the Areopagite, by whom he was consecrated bishop of that city, and was the first to preach the Gospel there
Diocese of Verdun (VIRODUNENSIS.)
Apud civitátem Meldénsem beáti Sanctíni Epíscopi, qui fuit discípulus sancti Dionysii Areopaíitæ; et ejúsdem civitátis Epíscopus ab eo consecrátus, primus illic Evangélium prædicávit.
    At Meaux, blessed Sanctinus, bishop, a disciple of St. Denis the Areopagite, by whom he was consecrated bishop of that city, and was the first to preach the Gospel there.
Comprises the Department of the Meuse. Suppressed by the Concordat of 1802, and subsequently united to the Diocese of Nancy, Verdun was re-established by the Bull of 27 July, 1817, and by the Royal Decree of 31 October, 1822. It was formed practically of the entire ancient Diocese of Verdun, portions of the ancient Dioceses of Trier, Châlons, Toul, Metz, and Reims, and became suffragan of the Archdiocese of Besançon. For the late tradition attributing the foundation of the Church of Verdun to St. Sanctinus, disciple of St. Denis the Areopagite, after he had founded the Church of Meaux, see MEAUX. Certain local traditions state that Sts. Maurus, Salvinus, and Arator were bishops of Verdun after St. Sanctinus, but the first bishop known to history is St. Polychronius (Pulchrone) who lived in the fifth century and was a relative and disciple of St. Lupus de Troyes
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4th v. St. Sylvanus, confessor lived in time of St Cyril
In óppido cui Leprósii nomen, in território Bituricénsi, sancti Silváni Confessóris.

    In the territory of Bourges, St. Sylvanus, confessor.
Maximus, bishop of Jerusalem, ordained Cyril priest about the year 345
,
5th century St. Florentius Hermit and disciple of St. Martin of Tours France
In território Constantiénsi, in Gállia, sancti Lautónis Epíscopi.
    In the territory of Coutances, St. Lauto, bishop.
A Bavarian, Florentius was ordained by St. Martin of Tours and sent to Poitou, France, as a missionary. He became a hermit on Mount Glonne in Anjou, and attracted so many disciples that he had to erect an abbey for them, now called St. Florent le Vieux.

530 ST FELIX III (IV), POPE revered in his day as a man of great simplicity, humility and kindness to the poor

 Romæ sancti Felícis Papæ Quarti, qui pro fide cathólica plúrimum laborávit.
    At Rome, Pope St. Felix IV, who laboured exceedingly for the Catholic faith.

UPON his return from his visit to Constantinople in the year 526, Pope St John I was imprisoned by the Gothic king Theodoric at Ravenna, and died very shortly afterwards.
   When therefore Theodoric caused the priest Felix to be nominated as his successor, the clergy and people at Rome were relieved that the royal choice had fallen upon so blameless and otherwise suitable a person and that they could without hesitation proceed to elect him. The new pope used his favour with the court to promote the interests of the Church, and obtained a decree imposing a fine on those who should disregard the ancient custom that a layman should cite a cleric only before the pope or his delegates. Fines levied for this offence were to be at the disposal of the Holy See for distribution among the poor.
   St Felix approved the writings of St Caesarius of Arles on grace and free will against St Faustus of Riez, and sent to the second Synod of Orange in 529 a number of propositions about grace drawn from the works of St Augustine, and so led up to the condemnation of Semi-Pelagianism by the council.
 Having been given two ancient buildings in the Roman Forum, Felix built on their site the basilica of SS. Cosmas and Damian the mosaics to be seen today in the apse and on the trium­phal arch of that church are those made at his direction.

After he had occupied the apostolic chair for four years St Felix died in 530. He was revered in his day as a man of great simplicity, humility and kindness to the poor. 

Though described in the Roman Martyrology as Felix IV, it is now decided that he is properly Felix III, a previous antipope having no right to figure to the numbering see Felix “ II” herein on July 29. A short account of his pontificate is given by the Bollandists under January 30. See also the Liber Pontificalis (Duchesne), vol. i, pp. 270 seq. Grisar, Geschichte Roms and der Päpste, vol. i, pp. 183 seq., and 495 seq.

568 St. Lauto Bishop of Constance in Normandy France
In território Constantiénsi, in Gállia, sancti Lautónis Epíscopi.
    In the territory of Coutances, St. Lauto, bishop.
His family estate became the village of Saint Lo. He is sometimes listed as Lo, Laudo, or Laudus, and he was bishop for forty years.
665 St. Salaberga {Sadalberga }Abbess and founder cured of blindness while still a child by St. Eustace of Lisieux
Laudúni, in Gállia, sanctæ Salabérgæ Abbatíssæ.    At Laon in France, St. Salaberga, abbess.
She was twice married, first to a man who died after two months and then a nobleman, St. Blandinus, by whom she had five children, including two saints. After some years, they agreed mutually to separate and assume contemplative lives. He became a hermit and she went into a nunnery at Poulangey; Salaberga was subsequently foundress of the convent of St. John the Baptist at Laon. She died there.

ST SALABERGA, MATRON, AND ST BOBO, Bishop (c. AD. 665 and  670)
ST EUSTACE of Luxeuil, traveling from Bavaria back to his monastery, was enter­tained in a household where one of the children, a small girl called Salaberga, was blind. He took oil, blessed it, and anointed her sightless eyes. Then he prayed over her, and her sight was restored. When she grew up Salaberga was married to a young man, who, however, died two months after the wedding. She took this to be a sign that she was called to serve God in a monastery, but her parents thought otherwise and she married again, a nobleman called Blandinus. By him she had five children, of whom two, Bauduin and Anstrudis, are venerated as saints. Salaberga had endowed a convent at Poulangey, and when they had lived in happy wedlock for a number of years she and her husband agreed both to withdraw from the world. Blandinus became a hermit and is venerated as a saint in the diocese of Meaux. Salaberga went to Poulangey first, and then, by the advice of St Walbert, abbot of Luxeuil, founded a new monastery at Laon about the year 650. This abbey was a very extensive establishment and had provision for both monks and nuns.
St Salaberga had a married brother named Bodo, and him she persuaded to become a monk, his wife joining the community at Laon. He was made bishop of Toul, and founded three monasteries, of one of which his own daughter was the first abbess. St Bodo’s feast is observed on the rith of this month. During the last two years of her life St Salaberga suffered continually from very great pain which she bore with corresponding courage and patience after her death her daughter St Anstrudis took up the government of the community. St Salaberga was buried at the abbey, and St Bodo’s body was later exhumed at Toul and brought to be laid beside that of his sister.

A life, previously printed in the Acta Sanctorum, September, vol. vi, has been critically edited by B. Krusch in MGH., Scriptores Merov., vol. v, pp. 40—66. He shows that the correct form of the name is Sadalberga but, what is more important, that the life, which professes to have been written by a contemporary, is really a compilation of the beginning of the ninth century. Certain references made to Sadalberga by Jonas, Abbot of Bobbio, in his Life of St Columban, are, however, more trustworthy. For Bodo (Leudin) see the Acta Sanctorum, September, vol. iii,
690 St. Emmeramus Benedictine Bishop martyr native of Poitiers
Ratisbónæ, in Bavária, sancti Emmerámi, Epíscopi et Mártyris; qui, ut álios liberáret, mortem sævíssimam, Christi causa, patiénter súbiit.
    At Ratisbon in Bavaria, St. Emmeramus, bishop and martyr, who patiently endured a most cruel death for the sake of our Lord, in order to set others free.
France, Emmeramus went to Bavaria, Germany, at the request of Duke Theodo. He became a Benedictine and abbot of Regensburg Monastery and then bishop of that city. On a pilgrimage to Rome, he was attacked by hired assassins at Kleinhelfendorf, near Munich, Germany Duke Theodo appears to have been the source of the assassination. Emmeramus is venerated as a martyr in Regensburg, where his relics are enshrined.

7th v. ST EMMERAMUS, BISHOP
This holy missionary preached the gospel with indefatigable zeal around Poitiers, of which city he is often stated to have been bishop; but his name does not appear in the episcopal lists of that or any other see. After having laboured thus several years, St Emmeramus was so touched with compassion for the unhappy state of so many thousands of idolaters in Germany and beyond the Danube that he went to preach the gospel in Bavaria. Duke Theodo detained him at Regensburg, as he was later to try to detain St Corbinian, to minister to his subjects. Emmeramus, after having preached there three years and gained to God a number of infidels and sinners, undertook a pilgrimage to Rome. He set out on his journey south but when he had reached Kleinhelfendorf, between Munich and Tirol, he was overtaken by, apparently, some representatives of Duke Theodo, who brutally mishandled him. The saint managed to reach Feldkirchen, but there died of the injuries he had received. His body was shortly afterwards translated to Regensburg. It is not known that he was ever bishop of that city or founder of the monastery there that bore his name.

The motive and circumstances of the murder of St Emmeramus are a mystery (the Roman Martyrology says oracularly that he patiently suffered a most cruel death for Christ’s sake that he might set others free). Less than a century after, his life was written by Aribo, Bishop of Freising, who gives an account of it that is a characteristic example of hagiographical invention, exaggeration, embroidery, or all three, for the sake of popular edification. We are told that before St Emmeramus left for Italy the daughter of Duke Theodo, Oda, confided to him that she was with child by a nobleman of her father’s court, and she feared the duke’s anger both for herself and her lover. Emmeramus authorized her to state that he himself was the partner of her guilt. The pious Aribo expects the reader to admire the magnanimity and self-sacrifice of Emmeramus, but, quite apart from the fact that he was recommending a lie, and a lie that would cause great scandal, it is difficult to see what would he gained by it except protection for the guilty man. However, the lady Oda acted accordingly when her secret was discovered, and her brother Lantbert and his men set off in pursuit of Emmeramus. When they came up with him at Kleinhelfendorf they tied him to a ladder, tore out his eyes and tongue, cut off his members, and left him to die amid an outbreak of supernatural marvels. St Emmeramus was at once acclaimed a martyr by the people.

Much has been written about St Emmeram (perhaps more correctly spelt Haimbrammus). There are lives by Bishop Arbeo or Aribo (in two recensions), another by Meginfrid of Magdeburg, and a third by Arnold, who belonged to the monastery called by the name of the saint himself. In the critical edition of Arbeo prepared for MGH., Scriptores Merov., vol. iv, pp. 452—520, B. Krusch has shown that the text printed by the Bollandists (Acta Sanctorum, September, vol. vi) represents substantially Arbeo’s genuine work and that it was written about the year 772. But even in its authentic form the data provided by Arbeo’s life are not trustworthy. See also A. Bigelmair, Die Anfange des Christentums in Bayern.’ in Festgabe A. Knopfler (1907), and J. A. Endres in the Romische Quartalschrift for 1895 and 1903. The genuine tomb of the saint is believed to have been discovered in 1894; on this see especially J. A. Endres, Beitrage zur Geschichte des M. A. Regenburgs (1924).

781 St. Lioba Benedictine abbess relative of St. Boniface
Born in Wessex, England, she was trained by St. Tetta, and became a nun at Wimboume Monastery in Dorsetshire. Lioba, short for Liobgetha, was sent with twenty-nine companions to become abbess of Bischofheim Monastery in Mainz, Germany She founded other houses as well and served as abbess for twenty-eight years. She was a friend of St. Hildegard, Charlemagne's wife
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9th v. St. Lanto, bishop In the territory of Coutances
In território Constantiénsi, in Gállia, sancti Lautónis Epíscopi.     In the territory of Coutances, St. Lanto, bishop.
1034 St. Lolanus Scottish bishop
whose life is Unknown because fifth-century legends obscure the historically accurate accounts of his labors
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1555 St. Thomas of Villanueva Augustinian bishop from Fuentellana, Castile Spain; Many examples are recorded of St Thomas’s supernatural gifts, such as his power of healing the sick and of multiplying food, and numerous miracles were attributed to his intercession both before and after his death.
Sancti Thomæ a Villa Nova, ex Eremitárum sancti Augustíni Ordine, Epíscopi Valentíni et Confessóris; cujus dies natális recólitur sexto Idus Septémbris.
    St. Thomas of Villanova, of the Order of Hermits of St. Augustine, archbishop of Valencia and confessor, whose birthday is the 8th of September.
He was the son of a miller; studied at the University of Alcala, earned a licentiate in theology, and became a professor there at the age of twenty-six. He declined the chair of philosophy at the university of Salamanca and instead entered the Augustinian Canons in Salamanca in 1516. Ordained in 1520, he served as prior of several houses in Salamanca, Burgos, and Valladolid, as provincial of Andalusia and Castile, and then court chaplain to Holy Roman Emperor Charles V (r. 1519-1556). During his time as provincial of Castile, he dispatched the first Augustinian missionaries to the New World. They subsequently helped evangelize the area of modern Mexico. He was offered but declined the see of Granada, but accepted appointment as archbishop of Valencia in 1544. As the see had been vacant for nearly a century, Thomas devoted much effort to restoring the spiritual and material life of the archdiocese. He was also deeply committed to the needs of the poor. He held the post of grand almoner of the poor, founded colleges for the children of new converts and the poor, organized priests for service among the Moors, and was renowned for his personal saintliness and austerities. While he did not attend the sessions of the Council of Trent, he was an ardent promoter of the Tridentine reforms throughout Spain.

ST THOMAS OF VILLANOVA, ARCHBISHOP OF VALENCIA (A.D. 1555)
ST THOMAS, a glory of the Church of Spain, born at Fuentellana in Castile in 1488, but received his surname from Villanueva de los Infantes, a town where he was brought up. His parents were also originally of Villanueva; the father was a miller; their state was not affluent, but solid, and their charitable disposition was the most valuable part of their son's inheritance. At sixteen he was sent to the University of Alcalá, and pursued studies there with success. He became master of arts and licentiate in theology and, after ten years at Alcalá, was made professor of philosophy in that city, being then twenty-six. Among those who attended his lectures was the famous Dominic Soto.
In 1516 Thomas joined the Augustinian friars at Salamanca, and his behaviour in the novitiate showed he had been long inured to austerities, to renouncing his own will, and to the exercise of contemplation. In 1518 he was promoted to priestly orders and employed in preaching and taught a course of divinity in his convent. His textbooks were Peter Lombard and Aquinas. Students from the university soon sought permission to attend his lectures. He was exceptionally clear-headed, with a firm and solid judgement, but always
had to cope with absent mindedness and a poor memory. He was afterwards prior in several places, and particularly solicitous for those friars who were sick.  He would often tell his religious that the infirmary was like the bush of Moses, where he who devotes himself to the sick will assuredly find God among the thorns with which he is surrounded.
  In 1533, while provincial of Castile, he sent the first band of Augustinians to the Americas, where they established their order as missionaries in Mexico. Thomas fell into frequent raptures at prayer, especially at Mass; and though he endeavoured to hide such graces he was not able to do it: his face after the holy Sacrifice shone, and as it were dazzled the eyes of those that beheld him.


Preaching once in the cathedral-church at Burgos, reproving the vices and ingratitude of sinners, he held in his hand a crucifix and cried out, Christians, look here -and he was not able to go on, being ravished in an ecstasy. Once while addressing a community at the clothing of a novice he was rapt and speechless for a quarter of an hour. When he recovered himself he said: Brethren, I beg your pardon. I have a weak heart and I feel ashamed of being so often overcome on these occasions. I will try to repair my fault.
     Whilst St Thomas was performing a visitation of his convents, he was nominated by the Emperor Charles V to the archhishopric of Granada, and commanded to go to Toledo. He obeyed; but undertook the journey with no other object than that of declining the dignity, in which he succeeded.  When, some years later, Don George of Austria resigned the archbishopric of Valencia, the emperor thought of not offering St Thomas this see because he knew how grievous a trial it would he to him. He therefore, it is said, ordered his secretary to draw up a letter of nomination in favour of a certain religious of the Order of St Jerome. Afterwards, finding that the secretary had put down the name of Brother Thomas of Villanova, he asked the reason. The secretary answered that he thought he had heard his name, but would rectify the mistake. “By no means, said Charles. "This has happened by a particular providence of God. Let us therefore follow His will. So he signed the appointment for St Thomas and it was forthwith sent to Valladolid, where he was prior. The saint used all means possible to excuse himself, but had to accept the appointment and was consecrated at Valladolid. Thomas set out very early next morning for Valencia. His mother, who had converted her house into a hospital for the use of the poor and sick, had asked him to take Villanueva on the way; but Thomas applied literally the words of the gospel, a man shall leave his father and mother and shall cleave to his wife, and hastened direct to the see with which he was now wedded, convinced that his office obliged him to postpone all other considerations to that of going to the flock committed to his care (later on he spent a month's holiday with his mother at Liria).
  He travelled on foot in his monastic habit (which was very old) with the hat he had worn ever since his profession, accompanied by one religious and two servants. Upon his arrival at Valencia he retired to an Augustinian friary where he spent several days in penance and prayer to beg the grace of God by which he might be enabled worthily to acquit himself of his charge.
     He took possession of his cathedral on the first day of the year 1545 amidst the rejoicings of the people. The chapter, in consideration of his poverty, made him a present of four thousand crowns towards furnishing his house, which he accepted in a humble manner and thanked them for their kindness, hut he immediately sent the money to the great hospital with an order to lay it out in repairing the house and for the use of the patients. He explained to the canons that our Lord will be better served and glorified by your money being spent on the poor in the hospital, who need it so much, than if it had been used by me.
 What does a poor friar like myself want with furniture.
    It is often said that Honours change manners, but St Thomas kept not only the same humility of heart but as much as possible the same exterior marks of contempt of himself. He even kept for some years the very habit which he brought from his monastery, which he sometimes mended himself as he had been wont to do. One of his canons, surprising him one day at this, said he wondered he could so employ his time which a tailor would save him for a trifle.
The archbishop replied that he was still a friar and that that trifle would feed some poor man.
 Ordinarily he wore such clothes that his canons and domestics were ashamed of him. When he was pressed by them to put himself into a dress suitable to his dignity his answer was, Gentlemen, I am much obliged to you for the care you take of my person, but really I do not see how my dress as a religious interferes with my dignity as archbishop. You know well enough that my position and duties are quite independent of my clothes, and consist in taking care of the souls committed to me. The canons eventually induced him to cast away his cloth hat and wear one of silk. He used afterwards sometimes to show this hat and say merrily, Behold my episcopal dignity. My masters the canons judged it necessary that I should wear this silk hat that I might be numbered among the archbishops.
  St Thomas discharged all the duties of a good pastor and visited the churches of his diocese, preaching everywhere in the towns and villages with zeal and affection. His sermons were followed by a wonderful change in the lives of men, so that one might say he was a new apostle or prophet raised by God to reform the people.  He assembled a provincial council (the first for many years) wherein with the help of his fellow bishops he made ordinances to abolish the abuses he had taken notice of in his visitation of his clergy.  To effect that of his own chapter cost him much difficulty and time. At all times he had recourse to the tabernacle to learn the will of God.  He often spent long hours in his oratory and, perceiving that his servants were unwilling to disturb him at his devotions when persons came to consult him, he gave them strict instructions that as soon as anyone asked for him they should immediately call him, without making the visitor wait.
  There came to St Thomas's door every day several hundred poor people, and each received an alms, which was ordinarily a meal with a cup of wine and a piece of money. He took destitute orphans under his particular care, and for the eleven years that he was archbishop not one poor maiden was married who was not helped by his charity. To his porters, to make them more keen in finding children that were exposed by their parents, he gave a crown for every foundling they brought him. When in 1550 pirates had plundered a coast town in his diocese the archbishop immediately sent four thousand ducats and cloth worth as much more to furnish the inhabitants with necessaries and to ransom the captives.
  Like many good men before and since, St Thomas was remonstrated with because a number of those whom he relieved were idle fellows who abused his kindness.
 If, he replied, there are vagabonds and work-shy people here it is for the governor and the prefect of police to deal with them: that is their duty. Mine is to assist and relieve those who come to my door.
  Nor was he only the support of the poor himself, but he encouraged the great lords and all that were rich to make their importance seen not in their luxury and display but by becoming the protectors of their vassals and by their liberality to the necessitous. He exhorted them to be richer in mercy and charity than they were in earthly possessions. Answer me, sinner, he would say, what can you purchase with your money better or more necessary than the redemption of your sins? At other times: If you desire that God should hear your prayers, hear the voice of the poor. If you desire that God should forestall your wants, prevent those of the indigent without waiting for them to ask you. Especially anticipate the necessities of those who are ashamed to beg; to make these ask an alms is to make them buy it.
     St Thomas was always averse from using the coercive weapons of the Church in bringing sinners to reason before methods of appeal and persuasion had beentried to the utmost. Of a theologian and canonist who objected to the archbishop’s delay in taking threatened strong measures to put down concubinage, he said
   He is without doubt a good man, but one of those fervent ones mentioned by St Paul as having zeal without knowledge. Is the good man aware of the care and pains I have taken to correct those against whom he fulminates?...Let him inquire whether St Augustine and St John Chrysostom used anathemas and excommunication to stop the drunkenness and blasphemy which were so common among the people under their care. No! For they were too wise and prudent. They did not think it right to exchange a little good for a great evil by inconsiderately using their authority and so exciting the aversion of those whose good will they wanted to gain in order to influence them for good.”
   He invited a canon, in whom he had long tried in vain to procure an amendment of life, to come and stay in his own house under pretext of preparing to go on an errand to Rome for the archbishop. Part of the preparation was to consist of a good confession. At the end of one, of two, of three months, the business for Rome was still not ready and all the time the canon was having unobtrusively put before him the fruits and benefits of penance. At the end of six months he left the saint’s house a changed man, his friends all supposing he had just returned from Rome.
   Another priest of irregular life upon being rebuked abused St Thomas to his face and left his presence in a rage. “Do not stop him,” said the archbishop to his chaplains, “it is my fault. My remonstrances were a little too rough.”

   St Thomas wished to extend the same sort of methods to the nuevos Cristianos or Moriscos, Moors who were converted to Christianity but whose conversion was often unreal or who lapsed into apostasy and so were brought under the brutal jurisdiction of the Spanish Inquisition. He was never able to achieve much for them in his large diocese, but he induced the emperor to provide a fund to support special priests for work among them and himself founded a college for the children of the newly converted.
   He also founded a college for poor scholars at his old university at Alcalá, and then, having scruples at having expended money outside his own diocese, he endowed another at Valencia. His material charity was equalled by his charity of judgement. Detraction he abhorred and he would always defend the cause of the absent. “Sir
, he would say, “you do not look at this from a right point of view. You are wrong, because he may have had a good intention. For myself, I believe that he had.”
 
 Many examples are recorded of St Thomas’s supernatural gifts, such as his power of healing the sick and of multiplying food, and numerous miracles were attributed to his intercession both before and after his death.

It is not known for certain why St Thomas did not attend the Council of Trent. He was represented there by the bishop of Huesca, and most of the Castilian bishops consulted with him before they left. He impressed on them that it was at least as necessary for the council to legislate for an internal reformation in the Church as against the Lutheran heresy, and made two interesting suggestions neither of which was in fact acted upon. One was that all benefices having the cure of souls should he filled by incumbents native of the place, so far as possible and providing they were well qualified, especially in rural districts. The other was that the ancient canon which forbade the translation of a bishop from one see to another should be re-enforced. The idea of the union of a bishop with his see as with a bride was always present to the saint, and he lived in perpetual concern for the proper discharge of his own episcopal duties. I was never so much afraid, he would say, “of being excluded from the number of the elect as since I have been a bishop.
 Several times he petitioned for leave to resign, and God was pleased at length to hear his prayer by calling him to Himself. He was seized by angina pectoris in August. Having commanded all the money then in his possession to be distributed among the poor, he ordered all goods to be given to the rector of his college, except the bed on which he lay. He gave this bed to the gaoler for the use of prisoners, but borrowed it of him till such time as he should no longer require it.
 On September 8 the end was at hand. He ordered Mass to be offered in his presence, and after the consecration recited the psalm In te, Domine, speravi after the priest’s communion he said that verse, “Into thy hands, 0 Lord, I commend my spirit
, at which words he rendered his soul into the hands of God, in the sixty-seventh year of his age. He was buried, according to his desire, in the church of the Austin friars at Valencia and he was canonized in 1618. St Thomas of Villanova was called in his lifetime “the pattern of bishops “the almsgiver the father of the poor, and nothing can be more vehement or more tender than his exhortation to divine love. “Wonderful beneficence he cries, “God promises us Heaven for the recompense of His love. Is not His love itself the greatest reward, the most desirable, the most lovely, and the most sweet blessing Yet a further recompense, and so immense a recompense, waits upon it. Wonderful goodness. Thou givest thy love, and for this thy love thou bestowest on us Paradise.”

In setting out the history of St Thomas of Villanova (Acta Sanctorum, September, vol. v) the Bollandists translated the Spanish life by Miguel Salon, a contemporary who, after a first biography published 1588, utilized materials furnished by the canonization processes to produce a more complete work in 1620. They also printed the memoir by his friend and fellow Augustinian, Bishop Juan de Mufiatones. This had been prefixed to an edition of St Thomas of Villanova’s sermons, etc., which Munatones edited in 1581. Some other sources, including a summary of the depositions in the Valencia and Castile processes, were also available, and these are used in the Bollandist prolegomena and annotations. The whole is supplemented by a notice of the saint’s relics and miracles. Not much fresh biographical material seems to have added to our knowledge since the Bollandists published their account in 1755. There is a brief sketch by Quevedo y Villegas, which was translated into English through a French channel for the Oratorian series in 1847. There is also a German life by Poesl (1860), and one in French by Dabert (1878). The writings of St Thomas of Villanova, however, have been collected and more carefully edited, and some translated into other languages.
1637 St. Lawrence Ruiz and Companions; Lorenzo: "That I will never do, because I am a Christian, and I shall die for God, and for him I will give many thousands of lives if I had them. And so, do with me as you please."
(1600?-1637)
   
Lawrence (Lorenzo) was born in Manila of a Chinese father and a Filipino mother, both Christians. Thus he learned Chinese and Tagalog from them and Spanish from the Dominicans whom he served as altar boy and sacristan. He became a professional calligrapher, transcribing documents in beautiful penmanship. He was a full member of the Confraternity of the Holy Rosary under Dominican auspices. He married and had two sons and a daughter.

His life took an abrupt turn when he was accused of murder. Nothing further is known except the statement of two Dominicans that
he was sought by the authorities on account of a homicide to which he was present or which was attributed to him."

At that time three Dominican priests, Antonio Gonzalez, Guillermo Courtet and Miguel de Aozaraza, were about to sail to Japan in spite of a violent persecution there. With them was a Japanese priest, Vicente Shiwozuka de la Cruz, and a layman named Lazaro, a leper. Lorenzo, having taken asylum with them, was allowed to accompany them. But only when they were at sea did he learn that they were going to Japan.

They landed at Okinawa. Lorenzo could have gone on to Formosa, but, he reported,
I decided to stay with the Fathers, because the Spaniards would hang me there." In Japan they were soon found out, arrested and taken to Nagasaki. The site of wholesale bloodshed when the atomic bomb was dropped had known tragedy before.
The 50,000 Catholics who once lived there were dispersed or killed by persecution.
They were subjected to an unspeakable kind of torture: After huge quantities of water were forced down their throats, they were made to lie down. Long boards were placed on their stomachs and guards then stepped on the ends of the boards, forcing the water to spurt violently from mouth, nose and ears.

The superior, Antonio, died after some days. Both the Japanese priest and Lazaro broke under torture, which included the insertion of bamboo needles under their fingernails. But both were brought back to courage by their companions.

In Lorenzo's moment of crisis, he asked the interpreter,
I would like to know if, by apostatizing, they will spare my life. The interpreter was noncommittal, but Lorenzo, in the ensuing hours, felt his faith grow strong. He became bold, even audacious, with his interrogators.

The five were put to death by being hanged upside down in pits. Boards fitted with semicircular holes were fitted around their waists and stones put on top to increase the pressure. They were tightly bound, to slow circulation and prevent a speedy death. They were allowed to hang for three days. By that time Lorenzo and Lazaro were dead. The three Dominican priests, still alive, were beheaded.

Pope John Paul II canonized these six and 10 others, Asians and Europeans, men and women, who spread the faith in the Philippines, Formosa and Japan. Lorenzo Ruiz is the first canonized Filipino martyr.

Comment: We ordinary Christians of today—how would we stand up in the circumstances these martyrs faced? We sympathize with the two who temporarily denied the faith. We understand Lorenzo's terrible moment of temptation. But we see also the courage—unexplainable in human terms—which surged from their store of faith. Martyrdom, like ordinary life, is a miracle of grace.
Quote: The Governors: If we grant you life, will you renounce your faith?
Lorenzo: That I will never do, because I am a Christian, and I shall die for God, and for him I will give many thousands of lives if I had them. And so, do with me as you please.


THE PSALTER OF THE BLESSED VIRGIN MARY PSALM 73

To thee have I raised up mine eyes, O Queen: who reignest in Heaven.

Let our help be in the power of thy name: let all our works be directed by thee.

Blessed be thou in Heaven and on earth: in the sea and in all abysses.

Blessed be thy fecundity: blessed be thy virginity and purity.

Blessed be thy holy body: blessed be thy most holy soul.


Make me desire thy honor and thy glory: that I may be received by thee into the peace of Jesus Christ.


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


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

Glory be to the Father, and to the Son and to the Holy Ghost as it was in the beginning and will always be.

God loves variety. He doesn't mass-produce his saints. Every saint is unique, for each is the result of a new idea.  As the liturgy says: Non est inventus similis illis--there are no two exactly alike. It is we with our lack of imagination, who paint the same haloes on all the saints. Dear Lord, grant us a spirit that is not bound by our own ideas and preferences.  Grant that we may be able to appreciate in others what we lack in ourselves.
O Lord, grant that we may understand that every saint must be a unique praise of Your glory. Catholic saints are holy people and human people who lived extraordinary lives.  Each saint the Church honors responded to God's invitation to use his or her unique gifts.   God calls each one of us to be a saint in order to get into heavenonly 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 htmIndulgences 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 2000Quang 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  UniateChalcedon

Mary the Mother of Jesus Miracles_BLay Saints  Miraculous_IconMiraculous_Medal_Novena Patron Saints
Miracles by Century 100   200   300   400   500   600   700    800   900   1000    1100   1200   1300   1400  1500  1600  1700  1800  1900 2000
Miracles 100   200   300   400   500   600   700    800   900   1000  
 
1100   1200   1300   1400  1500  1600  1700  1800   1900 Lay Saints

The great psalm of the Passion, Chapter 22, whose first verse “My God, my God, why hast thou forsaken me?”
Jesus pronounced on the cross, ended with the vision: “All the ends of the earth shall remember and turn to the Lord;
and all the families of the nations shall worship before him
For kingship belongs to the LORD, the ruler over the nations. All who sleep in the earth will bow low before God; All who have gone down into the dust will kneel in homage. And I will live for the LORD; my descendants will serve you. The generation to come will be told of the Lord, that they may proclaim to a people yet unborn the deliverance you have brought.
Pope Benedict XVI to The Catholic Church In China {whole article here} 2000 years of the Catholic Church in China
The saints “a cloud of witnesses over our head”, showing us life of Christian perfection is possible.

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Saint Frances Xavier Seelos  Practical Guide to Holiness
1. Go to Mass with deepest devotion. 2. Spend a half hour to reflect upon your main failing & make resolutions to avoid it.
3. Do daily spiritual reading for at least 15 minutes, if a half hour is not possible.  4. Say the rosary every day.
5. Also daily, if at all possible, visit the Blessed Sacrament; toward evening, meditate on the Passion of Christ for a half hour, 6.  Conclude the day with evening prayer & an examination of conscience over all the faults & sins of the day.
7.  Every month make a review of the month in confession.
8. Choose a special patron every month & imitate that patron in some special virtue.
9. Precede every great feast with a novena that is nine days of devotion. 10. Try to begin & end every activity with a Hail Mary

My God, I believe, I adore, I trust and I love Thee.  I beg pardon for those who do not believe, do not adore, do not
O most Holy trinity, Father, Son and Holy Spirit, I adore Thee profoundly.  I offer Thee the most precious Body, Blood, Soul and Divinity of Jesus Christ, present in all the Tabernacles of the world, in reparation for the outrages, sacrileges and indifference by which He is offended, and by the infite merits of the Sacred Heart of Jesus and the Immaculate Heart of Mary.  I beg the conversion of poor sinners,  Fatima Prayer, Angel of Peace
The voice of the Father is heard, the Son enters the water, and the Holy Spirit appears in the form of a dove.
THE spirit and example of the world imperceptibly instil the error into the minds of many that there is a kind of middle way of going to Heaven; and so, because the world does not live up to the gospel, they bring the gospel down to the level of the world. It is not by this example that we are to measure the Christian rule, but words and life of Christ. All His followers are commanded to labour to become perfect even as our heavenly Father is perfect, and to bear His image in our hearts that we may be His children. We are obliged by the gospel to die to ourselves by fighting self-love in our hearts, by the mastery of our passions, by taking on the spirit of our Lord.
   These are the conditions under which Christ makes His promises and numbers us among His children, as is manifest from His words which the apostles have left us in their inspired writings. Here is no distinction made or foreseen between the apostles or clergy or religious and secular persons. The former, indeed, take upon themselves certain stricter obligations, as a means of accomplishing these ends more perfectly; but the law of holiness and of disengagement of the heart from the world is general and binds all the followers of Christ.
God loves variety. He doesn't mass-produce his saints. Every saint is unique each the result of a new idea.
As the liturgy says: Non est inventus similis illis--there are no two exactly alike.
It is we with our lack of imagination, who paint the same haloes on all the saints.

Dear Lord, grant us a spirit not bound by our own ideas and preferences.
 
Grant that we may be able to appreciate in others what we lack in ourselves.

O Lord, grant that we may understand that every saint must be a unique praise of Your glory.
 
Catholic saints are holy people and human people who lived extraordinary lives.
Each saint the Church honors responded to God's invitation to use his or her unique gifts.
The 15 Promises of the Virgin Mary to those who recite the Rosary ) Revealed to St. Dominic and Blessed Alan)
1.    Whoever shall faithfully serve me by the recitation of the Rosary, shall receive signal graces. 2.    I promise my special protection and the greatest graces to all those who shall recite the Rosary. 3.    The Rosary shall be a powerful armor against hell, it will destroy vice, decrease sin, and defeat heresies. 4.    It will cause virtue and good works to flourish; it will obtain for souls the abundant mercy of God; it will withdraw the hearts of people from the love of the world and its vanities, and will lift them to the desire of eternal things.  Oh, that soul would sanctify them by this means.  5.    The soul that recommends itself to me by the recitation of the Rosary shall not perish. 6.    Whoever shall recite the Rosary devoutly, applying themselves to the consideration of its Sacred Mysteries shall never be conquered by misfortune.  God will not chastise them in His justice, they shall not perish by an unprovided death; if they be just, they shall remain in the grace of God, and become worthy of eternal life. 7.    Whoever shall have a true devotion for the Rosary shall not die without the Sacraments of the Church. 8.    Those who are faithful to recite the Rosary shall have during their life and at their death the light of God and the plentitude of His graces; at the moment of death they shall participate in the merits of the Saints in Paradise. 9.    I shall deliver from purgatory those who have been devoted to the Rosary. 10.    The faithful children of the Rosary shall merit a high degree of glory in Heaven.  11.    You shall obtain all you ask of me by the recitation of the Rosary. 12.    I shall aid all those who propagate the Holy Rosary in their necessities. 13.    I have obtained from my Divine Son that all the advocates of the Rosary shall have for intercessors the entire celestial court during their life and at the hour of death. 14.    All who recite the Rosary are my children, and brothers and sisters of my only Son, Jesus Christ. 15.    Devotion to my Rosary is a great sign of predestination.
His Holiness Aram I, current (2013) Catholicos of Cilicia of Armenians, whose See is located in Lebanese town of Antelias. The Catholicosate was founded in Sis, capital of Cilicia, in the year 1441 following the move of the Catholicosate of All Armenians back to its original See of Etchmiadzin in Armenia. The Catholicosate of Cilicia enjoyed local jurisdiction, though spiritually subject to the authority of Etchmiadzin. In 1921 the See was transferred to Aleppo in Syria, and in 1930 to Antelias.
Its jurisdiction currently extends to Syria, Cyprus, Iran and Greece.
Aramaic dialect of Edessa, now known as Syriac
The exact date of the introduction of Christianity into Edessa {Armenian Ourhaï in Arabic Er Roha, commonly Orfa or Urfa, its present name} is not known. It is certain, however, that the Christian community was at first made up from the Jewish population of the city. According to an ancient legend, King Abgar V, Ushana, was converted by Addai, who was one of the seventy-two disciples. In fact, however, the first King of Edessa to embrace the Christian Faith was Abgar IX (c. 206) becoming official kingdom religion.
Christian council held at Edessa early as 197 (Eusebius, Hist. Ecc7V,xxiii).
In 201 the city was devastated by a great flood, and the Christian church was destroyed (“Chronicon Edessenum”, ad. an. 201).
In 232 the relics of the Apostle St. Thomas were brought from India, on which occasion his Syriac Acts were written.

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

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

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Mother Angelica saving souls is this beautiful womans journey  Shrine_of_The_Most_Blessed_Sacrament
Colombia was among the countries Mother Angelica visited. 
In Bogotá, a Salesian priest - Father Juan Pablo Rodriguez - brought Mother and the nuns to the Sanctuary of the Divine Infant Jesus to attend Mass.  After Mass, Father Juan Pablo took them into a small Shrine which housed the miraculous statue of the Child Jesus. Mother Angelica stood praying at the side of the statue when suddenly the miraculous image came alive and turned towards her.  Then the Child Jesus spoke with the voice of a young boy:  “Build Me a Temple and I will help those who help you.” 

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

Brief History of our Beloved Holy Priest Here and his published books of Catholic History in North America
Reardon, J.M. Archbishop Ireland; Prelate, Patriot, Publicist, 1838-1918.
A Memoir (St. Paul; 1919); George Anthony Belcourt Pioneer Catholic Missionary of the Northwest 1803-1874 (1955);
The Catholic Church IN THE DIOCESE OF ST. PAUL from earliest origin to centennial achievement
1362-1950 (1952);

The Church of Saint Mary of Saint Paul 1875-1922;
  (1932)
The Vikings in the American Heartland;
The Catholic Total Abstinence Society in Minnesota;
James Michael Reardon Born in Nova Scotia, 1872;  Priest, ordained by Bishop Ireland;
Member -- St. Paul Seminary faculty.
Affiliations and Indulgence Litany of Loretto in Stained glass windows here.  Nave Sacristy and Residence Here
Sanctuary
spaces between them filled with grilles of hand-forged wrought iron the
life of our Blessed Lady After the crucifixon
Apostle statues Replicas of those in St John Lateran--Christendom's earliest Basilica.
Ordered by Rome's first Christian Emperor, Constantine the Great, Popes' cathedral and official residence first millennium of Christian history.

The only replicas ever made:  in order from west to east {1932}.
Every Christian must be a living book wherein one can read the teaching of the gospel
 
It Makes No Sense
Not To Believe In GOD
THE BLESSED MOTHER AND ISLAM By Father John Corapi
  June 19, Trinity Sunday, 1991: Ordained Catholic Priest under Pope John Paul II;
then 2,000,000 miles delivering the Gospel to millions, and continues to do so.
By Father John Corapi
THE BLESSED MOTHER AND ISLAM By Father John Corapi
  June 19, Trinity Sunday, 1991: Ordained Catholic Priest under Pope John Paul II;
then 2,000,000 miles delivering the Gospel to millions, and continues to do so.
By Father John Corapi
Among the most important titles we have in the Catholic Church for the Blessed Virgin Mary are Our Lady of Victory and Our Lady of the Rosary. These titles can be traced back to one of the most decisive times in the history of the world and Christendom. The Battle of Lepanto took place on October 7 (date of feast of Our Lady of Rosary), 1571. This proved to be the most crucial battle for the Christian forces against the radical Muslim navy of Turkey. Pope Pius V led a procession around St. Peter’s Square in Vatican City praying the Rosary. He showed true pastoral leadership in recognizing the danger posed to Christendom by the radical Muslim forces, and in using the means necessary to defeat it. Spiritual battles require spiritual weapons, and this more than anything was a battle that had its origins in the spiritual order—a true battle between good and evil.

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

No other issue, not all other issues taken together, can constitute a proportionate reason for voting for candidates that intend to preserve and defend this holocaust of innocent human life that is abortion.

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

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

Father Corapi's Biography

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

Father Corapi's academic credentials are quite extensive. He received a Bachelor of Business Administration degree from Pace University in the seventies. Then as an older man returned to the university classrooms in preparation for his life as a priest and preacher. He received all of his academic credentials for the Church with honors: a Masters degree in Sacred Scripture from Holy Apostles Seminary and Bachelor, Licentiate, and Doctorate degrees in dogmatic theology from the University of Navarre in Spain.

Father John Corapi goes to the heart of the contemporary world's many woes and wars, whether the wars in Afghanistan, Iraq, Lebanon, Somalia, or the Congo, or the natural disasters that seem to be increasing every year, the moral and spiritual war is at the basis of everything. “Our battle is not against human forces,” St. Paul asserts, “but against principalities and powers, against the world rulers of this present darkness...” (Ephesians 6:12). 
The “War to end all wars” is the moral and spiritual combat that rages in the hearts and minds of human beings. The outcome of that  unseen fight largely determines how the battle in the realm of the seen unfolds.  The title talk, “With the Moon Under Her Feet,” is taken from the twelfth chapter of the Book of Revelation, and deals with the current threat to the world from radical Islam, and the Blessed Virgin Mary's role in the ultimate victory that will result in the conversion of Islam. Few Catholics are aware of the connection between Islam, Fatima, and Guadalupe. Presented in Father Corapi's straight-forward style, you will be both inspired and educated by him.

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


God Bless you on your journey Father John Corapi


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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

8 Martyrs Move Closer to Sainthood 8 July, 2016
Posted by ZENIT Staff on 8 July, 2016

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

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

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

On the List Are Lay Founder of a Hospital and Eastern Catholic Religious
VATICAN CITY, June 12, 2014 (Zenit.org) - Today, the Vatican announced that during the celebration of the feast of Christ the King on Sunday, November 23, an ordinary public consistory will be held for the canonization of the following six blesseds, who include a lay founder of a hospital for the poor, founders of religious orders, and two members of the Syro-Malabar Catholic Church, an Eastern Catholic Church in full communion with the Holy See:
-Giovanni Antonio Farina (1803-1888), an Italian bishop who founded the Institute of the Sisters Teachers of Saint Dorothy, Daughters of the Sacred Hearts
-Kuriakose Elias Chavara (1805-1871), a Syro-Malabar priest in India who founded the Carmelites of Mary Immaculate
-Ludovico of Casoria (1814-1885), an Italian Franciscan priest who founded the Gray Sisters of St. Elizabeth
-Nicola Saggio (Nicola da Longobardi, 1650-1709), an Italian oblate of the Order of Minims
-Euphrasia Eluvathingal (1877-1952), an Indian Carmelite of the Syro-Malabar Church
-Amato Ronconi (1238-1304), an Italian, Third Order Franciscan who founded a hospital for poor pilgrims

CAUSES OF SAINTS July 2015.
Pope Recognizes Heroic Virtues of Ukrainian Archbishop
Recognition Brings Metropolitan Archbishop Andrey Sheptytsky Closer to Beatification
By Junno Arocho Esteves Rome, July 17, 2015 (ZENIT.org)
Pope Francis recognized the heroic virtues of Ukrainian Greek Catholic Archbishop Andrey Sheptytsky. According to a communique released by the Holy See Press Office, the Holy Father met this morning with Cardinal Angelo Amato, Prefect of the Congregation for the Causes of Saints.

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

MIRACLES
– Blessed Alfonso Maria Fusco, diocesan priest and founder of the Congregation of the Sisters of St. John the Baptist (1839-1910);
– Venerable Servant of God John Sullivan, professed priest of the Society of Jesus (1861-1933);
MARTYRDOM
– Servants of God Nikolle Vinçenc Prennushi, O.F.M., archbishop of Durres, Albania, and 37 companions killed between 1945 and 1974;
– Servants of God José Antón Gómez and three companions of the Benedictines of Madrid, Spain, killed 1936;
HEROIC VIRTUES
– Servant of God Thomas Choe Yang-Eop, diocesan priest (1821-1861);
– Servant of God Sosio Del Prete (né Vincenzo), professed priest of the Order of Friars Minor, founder of the Congregation of the Little Servants of Christ the King (1885-1952);
– Servant of God Wenanty Katarzyniec (né Jósef), professed priest of the Order of Friars Minor Conventual (1889-1921);
– Servant of God Maria Consiglia of the Holy Spirity (née Emilia Paqualina Addatis), founder of the Congregation of the Sisters of the Addolorata, Servants of Mary (1845-1900);
– Servant of God Maria of the Incarnation (née Caterina Carrasco Tenorio), founder of the Congregation of the Franciscan Tertiary Sisters of the Flock of Mary (1840-1917);
– Servant of God , founder of the Congregation of the Sisters of the Family of the Sacred Heart of Jesus (1851-1923);
– Servant of God Ilia Corsaro, founder of the Congregation of the Little Missionaries of the Eucharist (1897-1977);
– Servant of God Maria Montserrat Grases García, layperson of the Personal Prelature of the Holy Cross and Opus Dei (1941-1959).
LINKS:
Marian Apparitions (over 2000)  India Marian Shrine Lourdes of the East   Lourdes Feb 11- July 16, Loreto, Italy 1858 
China
Marian shrines
May 23, 1995 Zarvintisya Ukraine Lourdes Kenya national Marian shrine    Quang Tri Vietnam La Vang 1798  
Links to Related
Marian Websites  Angels and Archangels
Doctors_of_the_Church   Acts_Apostles  Roman Catholic Popes  Purgatory  Uniates, 73 2023