Saint of the day and Feast days.

[Shin]

Us post-Vatican ll Catholics have gotten too soft.    I admit I'm soft too.  

Patricia, it's probably not half as hard as it is thinking about it as you might find in practice. Corporal mortifications can tend to be easier than other ones.

The hardest thing is probably the first step, and that's the mental part.
 
"The effeminate. . . shall not possess the kingdom of God", as the holy scriptures say.

From what I have read -- Traditionally, effeminacy is a vice known as softness, or attachment to pleasures and softness and inability to give them up to take on arduous tasks. In its worst cases its also associated with the unmentionable, but putting that off the table, it's important to know that it's a vice to be attached to softness and pleasures and be unable to give them up to do arduous tasks.

Men are by nature more suited for giving up softness and pleasures and doing very painful and arduous tasks, it's one of their particular virtues, due to their particular constitution. The virtue of fortitude. They are more single focused and easily able to block out emotional and physical pains, when properly formed in virtue. In these times, with everything upside down, most men have failed in this virtue and become effeminate, basically spoiled boys who do not work long into the ages of adulthood, because they cannot give up their pleasures, the vice has them.

A properly formed man excels in fortitude and mortification. He will sacrifice himself.

Women on the other hand excel in the virtues of temperance -- and modesty - normally, properly formed. Which of course in these times.. But I digress.

I have some notes I took from some conferences on the virtues I set aside for later, and here they've popped up again.

Perhaps I should practice more silence. 

[martin]

A good place to start with mortification could be to offer up all the little inconveniences, trials and pains that come to us each day in various forms (with a smile if possible  ) and then add on our own extra bits once we can cope with the ones we have no control over.

It all sounds pretty easy on paper don't you think. 
We men here must lead the way. We can't have the ladies calling us sissies. 
Right Shin, odhiambo!! Lets go!!!   I'm behind you' all the way. 

[Shin]

I wish I knew which orders did which mandatorially, and which optionally now that I think of it. When option I wonder how many individuals request to be allowed it under obedience, and how many it has totally fallen into laxity with.

Not a good deal is said about it for a number of reasons, from laxity to worldly surprise.

The Carthusian Fathers wear the hair shirt at all times, for example, except when bathing I have read.

Yes Martin I see you back there. 

 

[odhiambo]

Us post-Vatican ll Catholics have gotten too soft.    I admit I'm soft too.  

Patricia, it's probably not half as hard as it is thinking about it as you might find in practice. Corporal mortifications can tend to be easier than other ones.

The hardest thing is probably the first step, and that's the mental part.
 
"The effeminate. . . shall not possess the kingdom of God", as the holy scriptures say.

From what I have read -- Traditionally, effeminacy is a vice known as softness, or attachment to pleasures and softness and inability to give them up to take on arduous tasks. In its worst cases its also associated with the unmentionable, but putting that off the table, it's important to know that it's a vice to be attached to softness and pleasures and be unable to give them up to do arduous tasks.

Men are by nature more suited for giving up softness and pleasures and doing very painful and arduous tasks, it's one of their particular virtues, due to their particular constitution. The virtue of fortitude. They are more single focused and easily able to block out emotional and physical pains, when properly formed in virtue. In these times, with everything upside down, most men have failed in this virtue and become effeminate, basically spoiled boys who do not work long into the ages of adulthood, because they cannot give up their pleasures, the vice has them.

A properly formed man excels in fortitude and mortification. He will sacrifice himself.

Women on the other hand excel in the virtues of temperance -- and modesty - normally, properly formed. Which of course in these times.. But I digress.

I have some notes I took from some conferences on the virtues I set aside for later, and here they've popped up again.

Perhaps I should practice more silence. 

No way! How can you practice silence Shin!, I have adopted you as my on line teacher, though you do not know it

[Patricia]

Right Shin, odhiambo!! Lets go!!!   I'm behind you' all the way.

 

[odhiambo]

Right Shin, odhiambo!! Lets go!!!   I'm behind you' all the way.

 

 

[odhiambo]

Today is the Feast day of
Blessed John of Parma
Among many other Saints and Blesseds

[odhiambo]

Blessed John of Parma
Franciscan, and
Minister General of the Friars Minor
Also known as
Giovanni di Parma
John Buralli

John was born in Parma, Italy, in 1209. His family name was Buralli. He was educated by an uncle who was chaplain of the church of St. Lazarus at Parma. He progressed very quickly and soon became a professor of philosophy.
Around the year 1223, John left his teaching career and entered the Order of Friars Minor or the Franciscan Order, as it is more familiarly known these days.
After his profession John was sent to Paris to complete his theological studies. He was ordained priest, then was appointed to teach theology at Bologna, then Naples and finally Rome

In 1245, Pope Innocent IV called a general council in the city of Lyons, France. Crescentius, the Franciscan minister general at the time, was ailing and unable to attend. In his place he sent Father John, who made a deep impression on the Church leaders gathered there. Two years later, when the same pope presided at the election of a minister general of the Franciscans, he remembered Father John well and recommended him as the man best qualified for the office.

And so, in 1247, John of Parma was elected to be minister general. As general of the Order John traveled on foot, accompanied by one or two companions, to practically all of the Franciscan convents in existence. Sometimes he would arrive and not be recognized, remaining there for a number of days to test the true spirit of the brothers.
The pope called on John to serve as legate to Constantinople, where he was most successful in winning back the schismatic Greeks. Upon his return he asked that someone else take his place to govern the Order. St. Bonaventure, at John's urging, was chosen to succeed him. John took up a life of prayer in the hermitage at Greccio.

Many years later, John learned that the Greeks, who had been reconciled with the Church for a time, had relapsed into schism.
He was about 80 years old by then. His advanced age not withstanding, John obtained permission from Pope Nicholas IV to return to Greece in an effort to restore unity once more. He however, traveled only as far as Camerino (in the Marches of Ancona), where he died in the convent of the friars on 19 March 1289. Many miracles were soon reported at his tomb.

John was beatified in 1777.

Blessed John of Parma
Pray for us!

[Shin]

 
 

[Shin]

I will have to pretend not to know it.   


March 21st is also St. Nicholas of Flue's day, the Patron Saint of Switzerland.

'My Lord and my God, take from me everything that distances me from you.
My Lord and my God, give me everything that brings me closer to you.
My Lord and my God, detach me from myself to give my all to you.'

St. Nicholas of Flue

From various sources:

'After receiving a mystical vision of a lily eaten by a horse, which he recognized as indicating that the cares of his worldly life (the draft horse pulling a plough) was swallowing up his spiritual life (the lily, a symbol of purity) he decided to devote himself entirely to the contemplative life. In 1467, he left his wife and his ten children with her consent and set himself up as a hermit in the Ranft chine in Switzerland, establishing a chantry for a priest from his own funds so that he could assist at mass daily. He survived for twenty years with no food or drink, except for Holy Communion, as was carefully established by investigation.

He wore neither shoes nor cap, and even in winter was clad merely in a hermit's gown. In 1468 he saved the town of Sarnen from a conflagration by his prayers and the sign of the cross. God also favored him with numerous visions and the gift of prophecy. Distinguished persons from nearly every country of Europe came to him for counsel in matters of the utmost importance. At first he lived in a narrow hut, which he himself had built with branches and leaves, and came daily to Mass either at Sachseln or at Kerns. Early in 1469 the civil authorities built a cell and a chapel for him, and on 29 April of the same year the chapel was dedicated by the vicar-general of Constance, Thomas, Bishop of Ascalon. In 1479 a chaplain was put in charge of the chapel, and thenceforth Nicholas always remained in the Ranft.

When in 1480 delegates of the Swiss confederates assembled at Stans to settle their differences, and civil war seemed inevitable, Henry Imgrund, the pastor of Stans, hastened to Nicholas, begging him to prevent the shedding of blood.

The priest returned to the delegates with the hermit's counsels and propositions, and civil war was averted.'

[odhiambo]

I will have to pretend not to know it.   


March 21st is also St. Nicholas of Flue's day, the Patron Saint of Switzerland.

'My Lord and my God, take from me everything that distances me from you.
My Lord and my God, give me everything that brings me closer to you.
My Lord and my God, detach me from myself to give my all to you.'

St. Nicholas of Flue

 

A wonderful prayer!
Doesn't the first line ring a bell? Everything that distances us from the Lord is the flesh as Brigid has said in her post "the flesh"
Saint Nicholas of Flue,
Pray for us!

[odhiambo]

22 March

Today is the Feast day of
Saint Nicholas Owen
Among many other saints

[odhiambo]

Saint Nicholas Owen
Martyr.

Very little is known about the early life of Saint Nicholas but it is believed that he was born in Oxford, England around the year 1550 into a devoutly Catholic family. and grew up during the Penal Laws in the reign of Queen Elizabeth I of England. An explanation of Penal in English history :“In English history, penal law refers to a specific series of laws that sought to uphold the establishment of the Church of England against Protestant nonconformists and Roman Catholics, by imposing various forfeitures, civil penalties, and civil disabilities upon these dissenters”
Nicholas was a carpenter by trade and for about thirty years, he built hiding-places for priests being persued by English authorities, in the homes of Catholic families. He frequently travelled from one house to another, under the name of "Little John", accepting only the necessities of life as payment. Constructing these hiding places often involved breaking through thick stonework. To minimize the likelihood of betrayal he often worked at night, and always alone. The number of hiding-places he constructed were never known and, to the ingenuity of his craftsmanship, some may still be undiscovered.

For many years, Owen worked in the service of the Jesuit priest Henry Garnet, and was admitted into the Society of Jesus as a lay brother in 1580. He was first arrested in 1582 or 1583, after the execution of Edmund Campion, for publicly proclaiming the latter's innocence, but was later released. He was arrested again in 1594, and was tortured. He was released after a wealthy Catholic family paid a fine on his behalf.
Nicholas resumed his work, and it is believed that he masterminded the escape of Jesuit Father John Gerard from the Tower of London in 1597.

Early in 1606, Nicholas was arrested again with several priests at Hindlip Hall in Worcestershire. He gave himself up voluntarily in the hope of distracting attention from some other priests who were hiding nearby. Realizing just whom they had caught, and his value, Secretary of State, Robert Cecil exulted: "It is incredible, how great was the joy caused by his arrest... knowing the great skill of Owen in constructing hiding places, and the innumerable quantity of dark holes which he had schemed for hiding priests all throughout England."
After being committed to the Marshalsea, a prison on the southern bank of the Thames, Nicholas was removed to the Tower. He was tried for supposed complicity in the “Gunpowder Plot” Under English law, he was exempt from torture, having been maimed a few years before when a horse had fallen on him. He was, however, submitted to terrible torture on the Topcliffe rack, dangling from a wall with both wrists held fast in iron gauntlets and his body hanging. When this proved insufficient to make him talk, heavy weights were added to his feet. This procedure was followed until "his bowels gushed out with his life. The saint died most horribly.

The exact date of his death in 1606 is not agreed. Most sources cite 2 March, while others place his death on 12 November. Father Gerard wrote of him:

"I verily think no man can be said to have done more good of all those who laboured in the English vineyard. He was the immediate occasion of saving the lives of many hundreds of persons, both ecclesiastical and secular."
Saint Nicholas Owen was canonized as one of the Forty Martyrs of England and Wales by Pope Paul VI on 25 October 1970.

Saint Nicholas.
Pray for us!

[Bailey2]

odhiambo, I just want to say that I really truly appreciate this service you are providing.  I read these posts whenever I can even when I don't actually post here.  Blessings!

[martin]

I've no doubt that the sacrafices of these English martyrs will be the price paid for the reconversion of England in the Lords good time.

On Saturday coming we have the feast day of St Margaret Clitherow (probably one of the better known English martyrs) and one whom I invoke daily. I visited her house in the Shambles while I was in York and got to learn much about her life and martyrdom.

Holy martyrs of England orate pro nobis.

[Patricia]

Saint Nicholas Owen's life is amazing. He is a hero.  I am so blessed to read about him. Never heard of him before. A mix of courage    and genius