Saint of the day and Feast days.

[odhiambo]

24th November

To day is the Feast day of
Saint Andrew Dung-Lac and Companions
Among many other saints.

[odhiambo]

Saint Andrew Dung Lac and Companions.
Saint Andrew Dung-Lac was a Vietnamese diocesan priest. He was from a poor family. He was taught by a Christian lay Catechist. He worked in the mission with priests of the Foreign Mission Society; was baptized and eventually became a priest.
During the persecutions of Christians by Minh  Meng, the Emperor of Vietnam between 1820 and 1840, Andrew was imprisoned and repeatedly tortured. He was eventually beheaded on December 21, 1839
Saint Andrew Dung Lac represents a group of 117 martyrs who died for the Roman Catholic Faith in Vietnam during the persecutions of Minh Meng as mentioned earlier.
The group was made up of:
96 Vietnamese
11 Spaniards
10 French
Eight among the group were bishops, 50 were priests, 59 were lay Catholics.
Some of the priests were Dominicans; others were diocesan priests who were members of the Paris Mission Society. One such diocesan priest was Saint Theophane Venard.
Among the many Vietnamese and international martyrs who died alongside Saint Andrew Dung-Lac, was also another saint, Saint Peter Thi.
Saint Andrew Dung-Lac
And Companions,
Pray for us!

[odhiambo]

Today is also  the Memorial of
Saint Flora of Cordoba
Flora was born in Cordoba. Her parents were Mohammedans but the mother converted to Christianity and secretly raised Flora a Christian. She apparently had a son who was raised Muslim. Flora was betrayed by her brother as being Christian. She was scourged and put into his custody so that he might persuade her to apostatize. She escaped. Later, while praying in Saint Acislus Church. She met a Christian named Mary. Mary was the sister of a deacon who had just been martyred. The two decided to stop running and to give themselves up as Christians. They were sent to a brothel. When their ordeal there did not shake their constancy, they were beheaded.
The year was 851.
Among other patronages, flora is the patron of abandoned people and
betrayal victims.
Saint Flora,
Pray for us!

[odhiambo]

25th November

Today is the Memorial of
Saint Columban
Among many other saints.

[odhiambo]

Saint Columban ( Columbanus)
Columban was born in leinster , Ireland.
He belonged to a noble family and was well educated. He decided on a monastic life while still young.
He went to a monk on an island in Lough Erne and lived there for sometime as a hermit, in a place called Cluain  Inis. He went to the great monastic seat of learning at Bangor where he studied with Saint Comgall.
Columban was ordained a priest about the year 590.
After many years of seclusion and prayers, he and twelve other companions, traveled to Gaul as missionaries. They founded monasteries at Annegray, Luxenil and Fontaine. These monasteries later became centers of religion and culture. They won widespread respect for their discipline, their preaching and their commitment to charity and religious life at a time characterized by clerical slackness and civil strife.
As is common with most saints, Columban had faced difficulties and opposition, especially when he denounced King Thierry II of Burgundy  in 610 for keeping concubines.
Columban and his monks were deported back to Ireland that year. On his way home to Ireland, however, Columban and his group were shipwrecked.
He continued his work in Europe, evangelizing the Alamanni people around Lake Constance ( modern Germany and Switzerland), ultimately arriving in Italy where he found favor with the King of the Lombards.
In his last years, Saint Columban established the famous monastery of Bobbio, Where he himself died in 615.
His writings include a treatise on penance and against Arianism, sermons, poetry and his monastic rule.
Saint Columban
Pray for us!

[Patricia]

St Columba pray for us!  Martin, we need a comment from you about your favorite saint!

[odhiambo]

St Columba pray for us!  Martin, we need a comment from you about your favorite saint!

Yeeh!

[odhiambo]

November 26

Today we will remembe
Saint Catherine of Alexandria
Among many other saints.
Officially her Memorial was yesterday. Sorry for that 

[odhiambo]

Saint Catherine of Alexandria
Saint Catherine of Alexandria is also known as Saint Catherine of the Wheel and as The Great Martyr Saint Catherine.
She was the daughter of Constas, a pagan governer of Alexandria during the reign of Emperor Maxentius
Catherine was brought up as a pagan. She was a very beautiful young woman and well educated. Young men from the most worthy families sought her hand in marriage but she would have none of them. She told her parents that she would only marry someone who surpassed her in beauty, intelligence, wealth as well as social status.
Catherine’s mother was a closet Christian. She sent her daughter to her own spiritual father, a hermit living in a nearby cave in prayer and solitude. After listening to Catherine, the ‘holy’ man told Catherine that he knew of a youth who surpassed her in everything; such that “His beauty was more radiant than the shining sun, His wisdom governed all creation, and His riches were spread throughout the world…”
The hermit then gave Catherine an icon of Our Lady with the Child Jesus in her arms, and asked her to pray with faith so that Our Lady would show her Jesus.
Catherine prayed all night long and at last she saw, in a vision, the Blessed Virgin and the Infant Jesus. Our Lady asked the Infant Jesus to receive Catherine among His servants, but the Infant turned away from Catherine. She was still a pagan.
After Catherine was baptized, she had the same vision and Jesus this time received her with great affection.
Then, enters the Roman Emperor, Maxentius!
Fascinated by her beauty, wisdom and wealth, Maxentius offered marriage to Catherine, if she would deny her faith. Catherine instead, denounced him for persecuting Christians.
The Emperor called in a squad of some 50 pagan philosophers to convince her against the Faith.
She debated with them, and all of them were converted by her arguments! She also succeeded in converting Maxentius’s wife, the Empress.
The Emperor had them all martyred.
Catherine was thrown into prison and condemned to death on a spiked wheel, an instrument of torture in those days. The wheel, however, broke miraculously when it touched her. She was then beheaded.
The legend goes that after her death, her body was taken by angels to the top of Mount Sinai, where she is buried.
Saint Catherine’s monastery is still found there to this day. Her relics are in Cologne, Nuremburg, Rouen and Grevenrode.
Saint Catherine of Alexandria,
Pray for us!

[odhiambo]

27th November

Today is the Feast day of
Saint Francesco Antonio Fasani
Among many other saints

[odhiambo]

Saint Francis Anthony Fasani
(Francesco Antonio Fasani)

Francis Anthony Fasani is also called Francis Lucera. He was born at Lucera southeast Italy on August 6, 1681. He was the son of Joseph and Isabella Della Monaco Fasani. He was baptized Donato Antonio Giovani and called Giovanniello. He was sent to study under the Franciscans in Lucera and at the age of 15, he joined the Order. He was ordained a priest at the tomb of Saint Francis of Assisi on September 19, 1705. Later, Francis earned a doctorate in theology in Rome.
His first assignment in 1707 was to teach philosophy in the Convent of Saint Francis of Assisi in Lucera. Within a very short time of his teaching career, Francis was being referred to as ‘Padre Maestro’ because of the extent of his learning and knowledge.
Saint Francis was a remarkable preacher and was appointed to many positions in the Order.
It is said that the saint predicted his own death at Lucera on November 29, 1742.
He was beatified by Pope Pius X11 in 1957, and canonized by Pope John Paul 11 on April 13, 1986.
Saint Francis,
Pray for us!

[odhiambo]

28th November
Today is the Memorial of
Saint James of the Marche
Among many other saints

[odhiambo]

Saint James of the Marche
James was born of a poor family named Gangala at Monteprandone, Marche of Ancona, Italy in 1391. He began his studies at Offida, under the guidance of his uncle, a priest, who put him to school at Ascoli. He later joined the University of Peruga where he studied civil law, graduating with a doctorate.
After his graduation, James worked for a short time in Florence as tutor in a noble family and also as judge of sorcerers. He joined the Franciscan Order of the Friars Minor in the Chapel of the Portiuncula, Assisi on July 26, 1416. After his novitiate, James studied theology with Saint John of Capistrano at Fiesole, near Florence under Saint Bernadine of Siena. On June 13, 1420 when he was aged 29 years, he was ordained a priest.
After his ordination James began a preaching career that took him all over Italy and through 13 Central and Eastern European Countries. He was a very popular and effective preacher and converted many people (250, 000 at one estimate) and helped spread the devotion to the Holy Name of Jesus.
His sermons prompted numerous Catholics to reform their lives and many men joined the Franciscans under his influence.
With John of Capistrano, Albert of Sarteano and Bernadine of Siena, James is considered one of the “four pillars” of the Observant Movement among Franciscans. (I tried to look deeper into this movement but I must confess I have not really understood it. I would greatly appreciate it if someone could explain it to me.)
To combat very high interest rates, James established ‘montes pietatis’ which literally means mountains of charity. It was a non profit credit organization that lent money at low rates on pawned objects.
Not everyone appreciated Saint James’s efforts to help the community. Assassins tried to kill him twice, and both times, they lost their nerve when they came face to face with him.
James spent the last three years of his life in Naples where he died on November 28, 1476.
He was canonized on in 1726 as Saint James of the Marches.
Saint James,
Pray for us.

[Shin]

St. James of the March and St. Catherine pray for us!

The four pillars! That's the first time I've heard of that expression. I particularly love St. John of Capistrano, and reading St. Bernardine of Siena's sermons have been a real benefit to me!

The Holy Name of Jesus. . . That is going to help me remember St. James of the Marche!

St. John of Capistrano had a very moving life! His biography is on Saints' Books at the very end of the list!

[odhiambo]

29TH November.

Today is the Memorial of
Servant of God
John of Montecorvino
Among many other saints.

[odhiambo]

Servant of God, John of Montecorvino
John was born at Montecorvino Rovella in Southern Italy in 1246. Of his early years, I have not found much of a record, except that he was a soldier, a judge and a doctor before becoming a friar.
In 1272, when he was 26 years old, He was commissioned by the Byzantine emperor, Michael V111 Palaiologus to Pope Gregory X, to negotiate for reunion of the Greek Orthodox and the Latin Churches. John by then had joined the Franciscan Order which at the time was chiefly concerned with the conversion of unbelievers.
Pope Nicholas 1V also commissioned John, to preach Christianity in the Near and the Middle East.
John devoted himself to the mission in Persia.
In 1286, Arghun, the Khan or ruler of Persia, sent a request to the Pope to send Catholic missionaries to the Court of the Great Khan, the Mongul emperor of China. The Chinese emperor was well disposed towards Christianity.
Pope Nicholas entrusted John with this important mission to China.
He started on his journey in 1287, provided with letters to the various rulers in the region. His companions were a Dominican friar named Nicholas of Pistoia and an Italian merchant, Peter of Lucalongo.
They reached Tabriz, then the chief city of Mongol Persia. From here, they travelled by sea to the Madras region of India. Here, John preached for some 13 months and baptized about 100, 000 people. His companion, Nicholas, died here. John continued his journey, travelling by sea until he reached China in 1294. On arriving at the Capital Cambaliech (now Beijing), he found that the mongol emperor had just died and Timurleng had succeeded to the throne.The new ruler, though not a Christian, did not obstruct the missionary in his work. John soon won his confidence and settled, despite opposition.
In 1299, John built a church at a place called Khanbaliq and in 1305 he built another one, complete with workshops and dwellings for two hundred people, right opposite the imperial palace!
John gradually bought from heathen parents about 150 boys between 7-11 years of age. He instructed them in Latin and Greek; wrote psalms and hymns for them and trained them to serve Mass and sing in the choir.
He also familiarized himself with the native language; preached in it and translated the New Testament and the Psalms into Chinese.
John worked completely alone for eleven years, converting about six thousand natives to Christianity!
In 1303 or 1304, the German Franciscan, Arnold of Cologne was sent to help him and in 1307, Pope Clement V, very pleased with John’s success, sent seven Franciscans who were commissioned to consecrate John Archbishop of Peking. Only three of these envoys arrived safely. The three were: Gerardus, Peregrinus and Andrew of Perugia.
They consecrated John in 1308 and succeded each other in the see of Zaiton, established by Montecorvino.
In 1312, three more Franciscans arrived from Rome.
John died in Peking in 1328, honored as a saint and mourned by both Christians and non Christians . His tomb quickly became a place of pilgrimage.
Servant of God,
John of Montecorvino
Pray for us!