Saint of the day and Feast days.

[martin]

Without the burden of afflictions it is impossible to reach the height of grace. The gift of grace increases as the struggles increase.

St. Rose of Lima ora pro nobis

[odhiambo]

August 24
Today is the Feast day of
Saint Bartholomew.
Among many other Saints.

[odhiambo]

Saint Bartholomew.
Apostle and Martyr.
He is also known as Bartolomé and  Nathanael bar Tolomai.
Bartholomew, whose name means “Son of Tolomai or Talmai”,  was from Cana in Galilee. He was also one of the Twelves Apostles. His other name was Nathanael and this is the name with which he is identified in John. He became a disciple of Jesus when his friend Philip invited him to ‘come and meet the Lord’. When Jesus saw him, He called him an “Israelite….in whom there is no deceit!” We therefore know that Nathaniel was a very honest and sincere man.
After Pentecost,  Bartholomew, like the other apostles, went out and preached the Gospel to the masses.
It is believed that he preached in India and Armenia where he was flayed alive at Albanopolis, and then beheaded by the order of King Astyages.
His relics are  at Saint Bartholomew-on-the-Tiber Church in  Rome, Italy, and in the cathedral in Canterbury, England.
 
Saint Bartholomew,
Pray for us!

[odhiambo]

August 25
Today is the Feast day of
Saint Louis King of France
Among many other Saints

[odhiambo]

Saint Louis IX
King of France
Louis was born on April 25, 1214 at Poissy, France. He was the son King Louis VIII of France and Queen Blanche ( Blanche of Castile). He was raised in a pious manner by his mother. It is said that when Prince Louis was small, his mother hugged him saying: "I love you, my dear son, as much as a mother can love her child, but I would rather see you dead at my feet than ever to have you commit a mortal sin."
Louis never forgot those words.
His father died in 1226 when he was 12 years old. His mother became regent until he reached his majority.
Louis was reportedly, a remarkable king, deeply religious and a model of prayer, kindness and compassion.
He married Margaret, the daughter of count Raymund Berenger of Provence in 1224 and they were blessed with eleven children.
Saint Louis ruled his country well, fought many just wars and won many of them including the defeat he handed King Henry III of England at Taillebourg in 1242.
He led two Crusades. The first was in 1248 and captured Damietta in 1249. Unfortunately, he suffered a disastrous defeat at the hands of the Saracens at El Mansura in 1250 and was taken prisoner. He ransomed himself and his men. He then went to the Holy Land where he stayed until 1254 when his mother died. He returned to France then.
In 1270, Louis started off on his second Crusade. He contracted typhoid soon after landing in Tunisia. He died there near Tunis on 25 August 1270 .
His relics were in the Basilica of Saint Denis, Paris, France but were destroyed in 1793 during the French Revolution.
Louis was canonized in 1297 by Pope Boniface VIII.
The Saint was noted for his justice, charity and personal piety. He founded many religious and educational institutions.
He is said to be one of the greatest of all French Kings
Saint Louis,
Pray for us!

[odhiambo]

"Be kindhearted to the poor, the unfortunate and the afflicted. Give them as much help and consolation as you can."

St. Louis

From Holy spirit interactive
 

[Patricia]

Saint Louis King of France, pray for us!!

Would someone have any information about St. Patricia , my patron saint?  I was baptised with this patron saint and do not know anything about her. 

[odhiambo]

Would someone have any information about St. Patricia , my patron saint?  I was baptised with this patron saint and do not know anything about her.  

   August 25
Today is also the Feast Day of
Saint Patricia of Naples
Among many other saints.  

[odhiambo]

Saint Patricia of Naples
According to Our Sunday Visitor’s Encyclopedia of Saints, by Matthew Bunson, Margaret Bunson, and Stephen Bunson, Saint Patricia is known largely through legend.
According to these legends, she was a member of a noble family of Constantinople, ( modern Istanbul, Turkey); she was possibly related to the emperor. When a marriage was arranged for her, Patricia fled Constantinople. She went first on a pilgrimage to Jerusalem. then to Rome where she consecrated herself , her chastity to God. Other accounts are that she became a nun in Rome.
Patricia returned to Constantinople for the sole purpose of giving away all her wealth to the poor; that done, she went back to Italy. She is reported to have died soon after at Naples, around the year 665. Like Saint Januarius, a vial containing her blood reportedly liquefies on her feast day.
She is a patron of Naples.
Her canonization was Pre-Congragation.

Saint Patricia,
Please pray for your namesake and for us all!

[Patricia]

Wow!   Thanks a lot , Odhiambo!  Sometimes I thought St. Patricia was a figment of my mother's imagination. But my mother insisted that she was a saint. 

St. Patricia pray for us!

[odhiambo]

Wow!  Thanks a lot , Odhiambo!  

My pleasure Patricia  

[odhiambo]

August 26

Today is the Feast day of
Blessed Mary of the Angels Ginard Martí
Among many Saints and Blesseds.

[odhiambo]

Blessed Mary of the Angels Ginard Martí.
 
Angela Ginard Martí was born on 3 April 1894 in Llucmajor, Majorca, Spain. She was the third child of her parents, Sebastiano Ginard Garcia and Margherita Martí Canals.
She was baptized two days after her birth and given the name "Angela". Angela had two aunts who were nuns. Her mother used to visit them frequently. About the time of her First Holy communion which was on April 14, 1905, Angela felt drawn to the religious life and decided that she too, would become a nun.
When she was still young, the family moved to Palma de Mallorca. It was here that she began to earn money by embroidering and making women's hats. She also
 did household chores and cared for her younger brothers and sisters. She taught her younger siblings to pray; she read the Bible to them and taught them the catechism.
When she was twenty, she sought permission from her parents to enter the convent. They did not refuse but ask her to wait and think about it some more. She heeded their advice. A few years passed before she again asked her parents permission to become a religious. This time there was no hesitation. Her parents gave her their blessings and on 26 November 1921, she entered the Congregation of the Zealous Sisters of Eucharistic Adoration.
Her new life was centered on adoration of the Blessed Sacrament. She adapted easily to this life and in no time, was a model of goodness, simplicity, piety and obedience to the other Sisters.
 In time she took her vows becoming a full fledged nun.
Between 1926 and 1929 she lived and worked in the house of the Sisters in Madrid where she had been sent by her superiors.  She returned to Madrid in 1932 where she spent the last four years of her life.
In 1936 when the Spanish Civil War broke out therefore, Sister María de los Ángeles was in Madrid at the congregation's convent in the Dehesa de la Villa.
 With the war came religious persecution manifested with the burning of churches and convents and threats to priests, religious and Catholic faithful.
On 20 July 1936 the Sisters were forced to flee from their convent. They managed to escape dressed as lay people. Sister Mary of the Angels encouraged them with these words:
"All they can do to us is to kill us, nothing more".

Sister Mary of the Angels was forced to hide in the home of a family who lived nearby the convent. Sadly, however, she watched from their home the destruction of the church, her convent and many religious objects.
On the afternoon of Aug. 25, 1936, denounced by a porter of the dwelling where she had been given refuge, members of the military came to the home.
On entering the house, they immediately arrested the landlord's sister, who had given Sr. Mary of the Angels sanctuary..
With great courage and charity, Sr. Mary told the troops: "The woman you have taken hold of is not a Religious; I am the only Religious here".
With these words, she saved the life of another and was destined to be a martyr.
The troops seized her, bound her up and led her away. The following day, on 26 August 1936, she was forced to walk to her place of execution, the locality of Dehesa de la Villa.
Here, Sr. Mary of the Angels was shot and killed by firing squad.
 Her mortal remains now rest in the chapel of the convent of the Zealous Sisters of Eucharistic Adoration, in Madrid.
Sr. Mary of the Angels was pronounced venerable on 19 April 2004 by Pope John Paul II ; beatified on 29 October 2005 by Pope Benedict XVI
   
Canonized:
    pending; if you have information relevant to the canonization of Blessed Maria, contact:
       Blanca de Navarra, 9
       28010 Madrid, Spain

Blessed Mary of the Angels Ginard Martí,
Pray for us!

[Patricia]

Sister Mary of the Angels encouraged them with these words:
"All they can do to us is to kill us, nothing more".

"The woman you have taken hold of is not a Religious; I am the only Religious here".
With these words, she saved the life of another and was destined to be a martyr.

Great courage and fidelity ! Blessed Mary of the Angels , intercede for us!

[odhiambo]

August 27

Today is the Feast day of
Saint Monica
Among many other Saints.

[odhiambo]

Saint Monica of Hippo.
 Patron of Wives and Abused Victims

Saint Monica was born in 322 at Tagaste in northern Africa, precisely, present day Algeria. She was born of Christian parents and raised in piety. At the age of 20, she was given in marriage to a man SQPN describes as “a bad-tempered, adulterous pagan named Patricius”.
Monica suffered much at the hands of this “rough and angry” man as Saint Augustine describes is father in his book -the Confessions of Saint Augustine. The copy I have  and love, is a very, very simplified and shortened copy by Father Malachy Cullen O.S.A. for Saint Paul Publications- Africa. I would like to quote from it a paragraph which gives some insight into the life Monica had with her husband Patricius:

My father was Patricius,  a pagan and a rough and angry man. My mother  Monica was a Christian, one of the sweetest and best of women. At that time, husbands often used to beat their wives. When the wives came to draw water at the well, they used to cry and show one another the marks of their beatings. They wondered why my mother never had any marks to show. They said , “ Monica, your husband is a very angry kind of man and he commits adultery with other women. Yet you never quarrel and he never beats you. Why is this?”
My mother answered, “the one thing I want is peace in our home. I know that he follows other women but I do not abuse him. When he is angry with me, I am silent. I just pray to God in my heart until he has finished shouting. Later on when he is quiet, I tell him why I did this or that. That is my secret”

Wow! What a woman!
They had three children. Augustine, Navigius and Perpetua, with Augustine being the eldest child, the first born.
Through her patience and prayers, she was able to convert Patricius who reportedly converted on his death bed. Patricius mother also converted at the same time as his son.
  Patricius died  in 371, one year after his conversion.
 Following the death of her husband, Augustine, her eldest son, became her sole preoccupation. When Augustine was seventeen, he went to study at Carthage. From that time,  he abandoned God, embracing Manichaeism instead, and living altogether, a wayward life that included a mistress.
Monica prayed earnestly for Saint Augustine’s conversion. Her  hope and consolation were the words of a Bishop  she had turned  to and begged  "with floods of tears” to talk to her son. This is what the Bishop reportedly said to her:
“ It is impossible that the son of so many tears will be lost.”
Indeed Saint Augustine himself talks of his mothers tears in the book mentioned above when he was describing his mother’s prayers on his behalf: Here is how he described it:

“ She prayed for me at Mass every morning and at Evening Prayer and at every hour of the day. When she prayed, she used to lie flat on the ground and press her face against it and water it with her tears. And you of God of mothers, did not despise her tears.”

Monica followed Augustine to Rome in 383 and then to Milan in 386 where in 387, he was baptized at Easter.
She lived with Augustus and his son, Adeodatus.
Her mission successfully accomplished, Monica was on her trip to Africa but she died at Ostia, Italy in 387 as they were awaiting a ship to take them back to Africa.
Monica is the patroness of married women and is regarded as a model  for Christian mothers.
Saint Monica,
Pray for us!