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| Former French SSPX superior calls on Catholic to reject ‘criminal’ COVID jabs in ‘courageous refusal |
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Posted by: Stone - 10-06-2021, 01:04 PM - Forum: The New-Conciliar SSPX
- No Replies
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Former French SSPX superior calls on Catholic to reject ‘criminal’ COVID jabs in ‘courageous refusal’
‘Each one of us must act according to his conscience formed according to the divine law and not commit what is evil, even if he is the only one in the world to oppose it.’
![[Image: regisdecacqueray-810x500.jpg]](https://www.lifesitenews.com/wp-content/uploads/2021/10/regisdecacqueray-810x500.jpg)
Regis de Cacqueray
Wed Oct 6, 2021
(LifeSiteNews) — The former Society of St. Pius X district superior of France has condemned the use of abortion-tainted COVID vaccines and called Catholics to seriously consider the moral implications of receiving the jabs, warning of potential direct cooperation with evil.
In a statement published in French Catholic review Civitas entitled Non Possumus, Fr. Regis de Cacqueray, the former SSPX district superior of France, now a Capuchin monk, provided a detailed explanation of the production process for COVID vaccines and invited Catholics to reflect on the moral permissibility of receiving the jabs.
Fr. Regis de Cacqueray, now known as Fr. Joseph, started by giving details regarding the HEK-293 cell lines in the production and development of the mRNA vaccines were obtained and used. He listed the number and gravity of sins, past, present, and future, involved in the process.
Among the past sins listed were the actual abortion, vivisection of human beings, deprivation of both earthly life and the beatific vision for the aborted fetuses, theft, and usurpation of organs. For present sins, he listed fencing and illegitimate exploitation of human cells, cooperation in the industrialization of the human body, and injection of a vaccine containing human debris. And finally, as a potential future sin, de Cacqueray mentioned encouraging the vicious circle of creating new fetal cell lines.
The Capuchin acknowledged that “ordinarily unlawful, distant material and mediate cooperation can sometimes be lawful for proportionately serious reason,” but went on to question whether this applies to receiving the COVID vaccines.
He stressed the necessity of establishing the existence of a proportionate reason for receiving the HEK-293 vaccine, and establishing that the connection to evil is indeed “distant” or “mediate” as opposed to “immediate.”
“We must ask ourselves if the acceptance of receiving a vaccine that contains DNA fragments does not constitute a material but immediate cooperation with that ‘unspeakable’ sin that consists in accepting that man becomes a ‘consumer’ of elements of the human body derived from crime,” he wrote.
The priest listed five criteria to make that determination:
1. The gravity of the sins with which we are connected, either those that have been committed or those that continue to be committed.
2. The evaluation of the scandal caused by the acceptance of the vaccine.
3. The evaluation of the proximity of the consent to the vaccine with the sins listed.
4. (and 5.) The hope of avoiding the sin if one does not enter into connection with it and the more or less strict duty to prevent it.
He concluded that the moral cooperation with evil in accepting to receive the mRNA vaccines might be less distant than some have suggested and argued that even if this wasn’t the case, Catholics should still feel encouraged to stand up against this evil following the examples of the saints.
While acknowledging that “individual refusal to receive the vaccine will not prevent the laboratories from continuing to develop their immoral activity [which] we feel quite powerless to oppose,” he also argued that “this realization should not lead us to the perverse reasoning that it is useless to oppose it and to suffer all the damage that may result from it.”
Stressing that point even further, he wrote that “each one of us must act according to his conscience formed according to the divine law and not commit what is evil, even if he is the only one in the world to oppose it … the heroic example that it would give, has in reality an incomparable exemplary scope as the history of heroes and saints shows.”
Fr. de Cacqueray also gave a message of encouragement to Catholics and pointed out that they might not be as powerless as they think in this struggle, as resistance to the vaccine mandates has proven a major setback in the propagation of evil.
“A courageous refusal is already shaking the system and helping to weaken the Goliath of iniquity that challenges the Catholic world.”
Others in the Church have expressed similar sentiments, though Pope Francis remains a fervent supporter of the COVID-19 vaccines.
An English translation of Fr. de Cacqueray’s statement can be found HERE.
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| Short Articles on the Carthusian Order |
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Posted by: Stone - 10-06-2021, 08:17 AM - Forum: Articles by Catholic authors
- Replies (3)
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A History of the Somerset Carthusians, 1895
The foundations of the Carthusian Order were laid in the year 1084. St. Bruno and six friends (one priest among them) were the first Carthusians who bound themselves to perpetual silence. The Carthusian monk was originally known as “the Poor of Christ,” and his favorite occupation was/is the copying of books and manuscripts. The first constitutions (Customs of the Grande Chartreuse) were written down 44 years after the founding of the Order.
Silence is to be broken only in the case of the sudden illness of a brother, or of fire, or of any other unexpected danger, and even then only few words are to be used. They eat neither butcher’s meat, poultry, nor game. Their diet consists of fish, eggs, milk, cheese, butter, bread, pastry, fruit, vegetables. They drink water, but never take tea, coffee, or chocolate because such things were unknown to St. Bruno.
St. Bruno and his spiritual descendants did but literally carry out the command “Watch and pray.” And these faithful watchmen were put to the test in England (under Henry VIII); not even the evil pens of Cromwell’s infamous agents of destruction could write a single bad word against their character, though many indeed were the complaints against their conscientious steadfastness. Sebastian Brant said what was as true of the English as of the foreign Charterhouses: Degener nunquam fuit ordo visus Cartusianus. (“The Carthusian Order was never seen degenerate”).
The Carthusian holiness was scarcely attainable, the stern loneliness of the Carthusian rule hardly endurable … but from king and subject the Order met with reverence. But it may be asked, what was there in the Carthusians to cause [King] Edward I, the chief feature in whose character was not religious devotion, as well as [King] Henry II, to appeal to their prayers, especially when engaging in an arduous venture?
The answer lies in the frequently quoted sentence of St. Bernard, Otiosum non est vacare Deo, sed negotium negotiorum omnium (to be occupied with God is not idleness, but the business of all businesses) for no other monks so fully carried out the sentiment therein expressed. The slightest acquaintance with mediaeval literature suffices to make manifest the extremely personal worship of those times. The Blessed Trinity was indeed a living reality to men then; the language of their devotional writings, deeply reverential as was the spirit that animated it, was as familiar as if addressed to a well-beloved friend, whom, separated from them by some ordinary circumstance, they would see again. In those days, there was an extraordinary earnestness in all that men thought and did, so that they could easily appreciate and reverence the ardent devotion of the Carthusian, who spent himself in an exclusive service to that adored and Divine Friend. The Carthusian life had nothing, humanly speaking, to show for it; but to the believer in prayer it was not waste of time, being indeed one long form of prayer.
But in many cases the adoption of St. Bruno’s habit was an act of love. It was more; it was a supreme act of love, fulfilling an ideal of self-surrender so awful that it is little wonder if the Order, though winning an acknowledgment of its holiness, could win no place in the heart of the nation. The saints while on earth may be beloved; the saints in heaven are only approached through the awe and mystery of heaven, and these monks, it would seem, were already half-way to the far-off country.
Martyrdom is a high sacrifice; but it is a question whether to give up all that makes life worth having be not a higher, for it is a sacrifice of longer agony, a living death. In common with the monks of other Rules, the Carthusian, in taking the irrevocable vows, literally left house, and brethren and sisters, and father and mother (and even, it is to be feared, wife and children occasionally), and lands for Christ’s sake. Yet he [the Carthusian] gave more than they, for to them the chance was still open to distinguish themselves as preachers, and as teachers through the medium of books, and to gain through the medium of their intellectual gifts a power in the world of letters at least; but even this privilege and solace of the ascetic life he [the Carthusian] laid down on the altar of his solitude; preaching was forbidden to the son of St. Bruno, and learning must be for him strictly a means to the spiritual perfection of himself and his brother recluses.
It was in the spirit of the Magdalene, who poured out the precious ointment on the person of her Lord instead of spending the price of it on the poor, that the Carthusians made, without regard to the possible good they might do for their fellow-men, a free-will offering of themselves for the service of God, the supremely Beloved alone. The purpose that they fulfilled was to inculcate a lesson on the world; their mode of teaching it contained exaggerations; but since man ever perceives most clearly what is presented to him in an exaggerated light, exaggeration may have been useful, especially when the tumults of much war and the perpetual din of arms in the strife of might against right so often led him to forget to listen to the voice of righteousness.
The lesson that they set forth was that God has the first claim above all human beings to the highest love, and that to give that love rightly must entail sacrifice—no new lesson indeed, but that which beyond all other Orders they realized.
“Sæculi sordes fugit et prophanat
Et suam vitam, nihil ista curat,
Dulce nil Christo sine, nil amœnam .
Cartusiano.
Veste procedit cito nuptuali,
Obviam sponso manibus intentes,
Lampades gestans, oleo decoras,
Cartusianus.”
He flees the impurities of the secular world,
and does violence to his own life:
he takes no care for this; nothing is sweet without Christ,
nothing pleasant to the Carthusian.
In the wedding-garment the Carthusian quickly
goes forth to meet the Bridegroom,
with outstretched hands bearing
the lamps properly fed with oil.
**Women, indeed, are utterly refused to be admitted on any pretext within their bounds, knowing that, as instanced in Holy Writ, no wise man, prophet, or judge, not Samson, David, nor Solomon, not even the very first man formed by God, could resist the attraction of a wily woman.
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| On the Carthusian Liturgy |
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Posted by: Stone - 10-06-2021, 08:06 AM - Forum: Articles by Catholic authors
- Replies (1)
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The Carthusian Liturgy
by a Monk of Parkminster
Originally published in Magnificat: A Liturgical Quarterly, Ascensiontide, 1940, vol. II, no. 12, pp. 5-11
![[Image: Carthusian%2BRite%2BConfiteor.jpg]](https://4.bp.blogspot.com/-vWfpRpYYVAU/Tou4k1-n-gI/AAAAAAAAKlY/25yt6dUpeKc/s400/Carthusian%2BRite%2BConfiteor.jpg)
The Confiteor and Absolution as per the Carthusian Missal
Part One of Three
In the year 1084, near the feast of the Nativity of St. John the Baptist, St. Bruno with six companions entered the desert of the Chartreuse in order to seek God in solitude. Without any idea of founding a Religious Order, but prompted solely by an intense longing for God which could be satisfied only by a complete separation from the world, he formed in that desolate, ragged, mountainous tract of Dauphine, with his companions of like mind, a little group of hermits living in community. Since resigning the chancellorship of Rheims, he had already for about two years experienced Benedictine monastic life at Molesme under St. Robert, the future founder of the Cistercian Order, and, for a little while, had even lived in a hermitage at Seche-Fontaine. But he was unsatisfied, for the voice of God was inviting him into greater solitude.
It was while they were seeking a place sufficiently remote that the seven travellers called upon St. Hugh, Bishop of Grenoble, to ask for his blessing. In a dream, St. Hugh had seen seven stars; they fell at his feed, then rose up and lead him over wild, mountainous country, to a place known as the Chartreuse. In the midst of this solitude the stars came to rest and there God raised a temple to His glory. When St. Bruno and his six companions knelt before him and spoke of their longing to seek God in solitude, St. Hugh recognised the seven stars of his dream, and with great joy guided them to the desolate stretch of land which was part of his own diocese, about fifteen miles from Grenoble. The saintly Bishop not only helped them materially in the work of building cells, a church and a cloister linking all together, but became their lasting friend and protector; he consecrated the little church and frequently visited the solitaries, sharing their simple life.
Such an introduction is necessary if a true idea of the Carthusian liturgy is to be obtained, for it embraces at once the causes which brought it into existence, the reasons for its characteristics, and the spirit which has preserved its faithful continuity. St. Bruno and his companions were seeking God by means of a solitary contemplative life lived in community. Their intention was to gather the advantages of the eremitical life and at the same time to lessen its dangers by mitigating with it as much of the coenobitical life as experience would prove to be the best proportion. It followed therefore that the usual monastic routine and life of prayer would need modification and adaptation in order that greater solitude might be obtained.
St. Bruno himself was to spend only six years in his beloved solitude at the Chartreuse, for in 1090 he was summoned to Italy by the Pope, Blessed Urban II, an old pupil, who needed the counsel of his former master. He never returned to Dauphine but died in the year 1101 at La Torre in Calabria, where he had made a second foundation when at length he had been allowed by the Pope to return to solitude on condition of remaining near at hand. As has been said, our holy Father had no intention of founding a Religious Order; he therefore wrote no Rule, but was content to take what he needed from the writings of St. Benedict and those who had treated of the solitary and monastic life. For six years he instructed his little community chiefly by his example. For the Divine Office he continued the manner to which he was now accustomed after his period at Molesme, namely, the monastic psalter and the arrangement of the Office according to the Holy Rule of St. Benedict. And for Mass he followed the books and the manner of the place to which God had led him, that is to say, the diocese of Grenoble, which was that of the ancient See of Lyons, to which it was neighbour. Here, too, modifications were necessary both in Mass and Office, to make them suitable for monks living in solitude. Far from the haunts of men, there was no need for pomp or ceremony to surround the worship of God, which would but defeat the end of such a calling. There is about the Carthusian life a certain element of changelessness which arises from its very nature, and by which its spirit and its purpose have been maintained from the beginning. The reason for its existence does not change, neither does its appeal nor the mean by which it fulfills its end. The call to leave the world in order to live for God alone in solitude is the concern of God and the soul; it is a circumstance detached from time, nor need it suffer alteration therefrom. Similarly, as the Carthusian vocation remains the same in any age, to fulfill its purpose there is never any need to adopt new means or re-fashion old ones in order to lead a changing world to God. We have no contact with the world, nor parochial ministry of any kind, no call for popular devotion, and hence it is that the principles and practices which seemed best to our Fathers have been preserved. For such reasons as these the Carthusian liturgy is the simplest and most austere in the Church.
For forty-three years there was no written record of the life at the Chartreuse but in 1127 Guigo, the fifth Prior, wrote the "Consuetudines" -- the Customs. (P.L CLIII, col. 631-760.) The circumstances were as follows. At three places near Chartreuse -- Portes, Saint-Sulpice and Meyriat, groups of men had begun to live a similar life. They had written to the Prior asking him what rule of life they were to follow. He was unwilling to fall in with their request because, as he explains in the Prologue to the Consuetudines, there was really no need for him to write their customs since almost everything was contained in the Letters of St. Jerome, the Rule of St. Benedict and writers of such a character. It was only when the Bishop, St. Hugh, ordered him to do so that he committed to writing the things that they were accustomed to do. Actually, of course, he is describing the manner of life instituted by St. Bruno, for Guigo makes it quite clear that he is describing the things of which he is a witness, and is not in any way a lawgiver. In the Consuetudines is contained the basis of the whole of the Carthusian life, both for the Fathers and the Brothers. He begins with what he terms "the section of greater dignity, that, namely, which concerns the Divine Office, in which for the most part, we follow the way of other monks, especially in the ordering of the psalms."
At the same period, and again at the bidding of the holy Bishop, Guigo arranged the Antiphonary to which he wrote a preface setting forth the principles which guided him in his work. This preface, which is found in a few old Antiphonaries is given in full by Le Couteulx, Annales Ord. Cartus. Vol. I, p. 308. It is as follows: "The gravity of the eremitical life does not permit much time to be spent in the study of chant. For according to the Blessed Jerome, any monk, in so far as he is a hermit has not the office of teacher, and much less of a chanter, but rather of one who laments; one who mourns for himself and the world, and in fear awaits the coming of the Lord. Wherefore we have considered that certain things should be removed from the Antiphonary, or shortened. Things, namely, which for the most part, were either superfluous or were unsuitably composed, inserted or added, or had but little or doubtful guarantee for their authenticity, or none at all; or were guilty of levity, awkwardness or falsity. Further, anyone who carefully reads the Sacred Scriptures, namely, the Old and New Testaments cannot but know whether what has been emended or added is correct. We have done this in the presence of our most Reverend and most dear Father, the Lord Hugh, Bishop of Grenoble." In this preface Guigo adopts as his own the principles and sometimes the very words of Agobard, the strenuous reformer of the liturgy of Lyons, who three centuries earlier had been Archbishop of that See. (cf. "Liber de Correctione Antiphonarii" by Agobard, P.L. CIV, col. 329 seq.) Guigo's intention there is quite clear. Since monks leading a hermit life must not devote much time to the study of chant, Guigo's task was to fix the repertory of the Divine Office, both of the words and the music; in that way its integrity would be safeguarded and it could be learnt by heart, and would be known once and for all. Far from any intention of devising something new, which is a temptation in such circumstances, his endeavour was to return, as far as possible, to the text of St. Gregory, and whatever had been added to that was to be excluded. With this end in view he undertook a deliberate simplification by admitting only that which was considered authentically Gregorian. He refused place to all antiphons and responsories which were unscriptural; to all sequences, tropes, proses, hymns, in fact to all those additions which in the 11th century began to encrust the primitive offices. There were sometimes strange novelties. The sources of which is unquestionably Roman in its foundation; compared with a Lyons Antiphonary of the same date there is hardly any similarity. A first necessity would be the adding of four responsories for Matins to the eight of the Roman Office, since the monastic Office has twelve responsories; but nothing was added except what was considered to have been handed down from St. Gregory. The principle of authentic and non-authentic may be illustrated thus: in spite of the general rule of refusing place to all that was not scriptural, our Fathers made an exception in the Gradual for the Introits "Ecce advenit" of the Epiphany, the "Gaudeamus" and the "Salus populi" of the 19th Sunday after Pentecost, and for the Alleluia Verse "Dies sanctificatus" of the 3rd Mass of Christmas; and in the Antiphonary for the "O" antiphons of Advent and the "Te Deum" precisely because, though not scriptural, they were considered as authentic. The spirit of this principle the Order has faithfully maintained, thus preserving for our liturgy a certain fixity and sobriety which distinguishes it, and which harmonises so well with the stability and exigencies of our life. There have, however, been a few departures from Guigo's leading principles. Although there have always been hymns in the "cursus" of St. Benedict, Guigo, following the practice of Lyons, did not admit them, but the first hymns, four in number, were introduced by the General Chapter of 1143: Aeterne Rerum Conditor, Splendor Paternae Gloriae, Deus Creator Omnium and Christe Qui Lux es for Matins, Lauds, Vespers and Compline, respectively, which still remain the only hymns for Sundays, lesser feasts and ferias throughout the greater part of the year. The Masses "Salve Sancta Parens" and "Requiem" were introduced, the latter as companion to the Mass "Respice," which alone until the fourteenth century had been used for the Dead. The Office of the Blessed Trinity, which is partly non-scriptural, was composed and introduced at the end of the same century. The "cursus ferialis," however, has been treasured and guarded, and for feasts, even those of Our Lady, and exceptionally great use is made of the Common. The most striking example of this is surely the case of the feast of our Father, St. Bruno. He was canonised in the year 1514, at a period which gave itself to composition and invention, yet every word and every note of both Office and Mass is from the Common of a Confessor not a Bishop. In brief summary, therefore, we may say regarding our liturgical books, that the various books for Mass were taken from Lyons through Grenoble, with adaptations for the solitary life, that the Psalter and the ordering of the Office was monastic and that the Antiphonary is fundamentally roman. We have at Parkminister a Gradual of the early 12th century in which characteristics proper to the early manuscripts of Lyons are clearly recognised.
In 1142, under St. Anthelme the 7th Prior, there was instituted the General Chapter, on which occasion other communities in the neighbourhood of the Chartreuse leading a similar life were united under the authority of the Prior of the Chartreuse and the General Chapter. The first act was to bring about uniformity in the liturgy. (P.L. CLIII, col. 1126.) Then, in 1259 were promulgated what are known as the Statuta Antiqua, and the evolution of the liturgical texts and rites was now fixed. It had been the custom to mingle directions concerning the liturgy and discipline with each other in the Statutes, but in 1582 all liturgical matter was removed and made into a separate book known as the Ordinarium Finally in 1603 the Missal was corrected in conformity to the revision ordered by the Council of Trent; and in 1687 a revision of all liturgical books was ordered by the Sacred Congregation of Rites. These revisions were concerned merely with producing conformity with the Vulgate, and affected only words.
Before treating of the actual procedure of the Mass and Office it will be necessary to give a brief description of the life in a Charterhouse and how the liturgy and that life interact. The Carthusian life, as it has been said, is a blending of solitary and community life. Reasons have already been given why the solitude of the community as a whole has left an impress on the liturgy; we shall now see the influence upon it of the solitude of the individual in the community. The Carthusian monk lives alone in a cell which consists of a little house and garden. The cells are quite separate, and there is complete privacy. A certain spaciousness is essential in a Charterhouse to ensure that sense of being alone which a room on a corridor does not provide. The ground-floor of the cell is a workshop; the upper floor consists of two rooms in the larger of which the monk passes most of his life. In a corner is the oratory which is furnished like a choir stall; his bed is in an alcove; there is a bookcase, a table for study and a place near the window where he takes his food. The silence is intense.
The monk leaves his cell to go to church for the Night Office, that is Matins and Lauds, for Mass in the morning and once again in the afternoon for Vespers. He is free to visit the Prior, his confessor and, at stated times, the library; but for the rest he lives in the silence and solitude of his cell, not even making visits to the Blessed Sacrament. He occupies himself with the traditional concerns of a monk -- prayer, study and manual labour. The Hours of the Divine Office apportion the times of the day allotted to these: spiritual exercises until Sext, study and manual labour until Vespers, followed again by spiritual exercises. His time for taking food depends upon the hour of Sext or None; his time for rising is fixed by the time of Matins and Prime. The changes in time of the various Hours of the Divine Office for Feasts and Fasts effect the external order of his life. He recites the Little Hours and Compline in his oratory, using the same ceremonies as in choir. Before each Hour of the Divine Office he says the corresponding Hour of the Office of Our Lady, with the exception of Compline of Our Lady, which is said last of all. Thus at the sound of the great bell, each monk goes to his oratory and there is formed one vast choir, although each in his cell. The most frequent horarium is as follows: 6:00am Prime; 7:15 Conventual Mass, followed by Terce and Private Masses in the chapels; 10:00 Sext; 11:00 None; 2:45 Vespers; 5:45 or 6:00 Compline; about 11:30 Night Office. Such is the day of solitude.
But there are certain days, namely Sundays, Chapter Feasts and Solemnities, when the Carthusian leads more of a community life. On such days all the Divine Office is sung in choir, except Compline which is always said in the cell; the monk attends Chapter, takes his food in the refectory, and he may, if he wishes, take recreation or colloquium with his brethren after None. Such days are an integral part of Carthusian life and have been observed from the earliest days of the Order. They are reminiscent of the custom of the ancient solitaries of the desert who on Sundays and Feasts met their brethren for the celebration of the sacred Mysteries which was followed by a meal taken in common.
It will be readily observed that if the number of such Feasts be allowed to grow unchecked, the chief purpose of our vocation would be greatly impeded; hence the swing of increase and reduction in their numbers as the centuries pass. The earlier calendar that we possess belongs to the year 1134 -- just seven years after the "Consuetudines." It is practically the early Roman calendar from the beginning of the ninth to twelfth century. In the following numbers no account is is taken of Sundays, nor of the possibility of such feasts falling on a Sunday, which would add complication -- though it should be noticed that as no feasts were transferred in the early days of the Order while some now are, there would be a slight difference in favour of the earlier numbers. In 1134 there were 33 Chapters Feasts and Solemnities; by the end of the century, 38; the numbers for the next three centuries are 39, 51 and 54 respectively. By the end of the 16th century the maximum is reached -- 69; then begins the reduction: in 1603 the number has already fallen to 63, and thus it continues to decrease until in 1914, as also today, there are only 40 such days -- about the same number as at the beginning.
Actually there can never be the same amount of solitude as there has been in the early days of the Order, for a reason which surely turns such a loss into the greatest gain. Guigo wrote: "Roro quippe hic missa canitur," and gave the reason: there was no daily Conventual Mass in order that solitude might be preserved. Mass was sung on all Sundays, Chapters Feasts and Solemnities, each day from Ash Wednesday until Holy Saturday inclusively, except the Saturdays before the First Sunday of Lent and Palm Sunday, for which days there is no ferial Mass in the Carthusian Missal, on the Ember Saturdays, eight Vigils and the first three days of the Octaves of Easter and Pentecost; there were various Masses for the Dead. Private Masses were a thing unknown, and there was only on altar in the church. By the year 1259, after a gradual increase in number, daily Conventual Mass was already established, and when a few years earlier a second altar had been erected the saying of Private Masses began; it became more frequent, and thus led to the need for more altars, until by the end of the 14th century the custom of Private Masses is firmly established.
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| October 6th – St. Bruno, Confessor |
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Posted by: Stone - 10-06-2021, 07:31 AM - Forum: October
- Replies (2)
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October 6 – St. Bruno, Confessor
Among the diverse religious families, none is held in higher esteem by the Church than the Carthusian; the prescriptions of the corpus juris determine that a person may pass from any other Order into this, without deterioration. And yet it is of all the least given to active works. Is not this a new, and not the least convincing, proof that outward zeal, how praiseworthy soever, is not the only, or the principal thing in God’s sight? The Church, in her fidelity, values all things according to the preferences of her divine Spouse. Now, our Lord esteems His elect not so much by the activity of their works, as by the hidden perfection of their lives; that perfection which is measured by the intensity of the divine life, and of which it is said: “Be you therefore perfect, as also your heavenly Father is perfect.” Again it is said of this divine life: “You are dead and your life is hid with Christ in God.” The Church, then, considering the solitude and silence of the Carthusian, his abstinence even unto death, his freedom to attend to God through complete disengagement from the senses and from the world—sees therein the guarantee of a perfection which may indeed be met with elsewhere, but here appears to be far more secure. Hence, though the field of labor is ever widening, though the necessity of warfare and struggle grows ever more urgent, she does not hesitate to shield with the protection of her laws, and to encourage with the greatest favors, all who are called by grace to the life of the desert. The reason is not far to seek. In an age, when every effort to arrest the world in its headlong downward career seems vain, has not man greater need than ever to fall back upon God? The enemy is aware of it; and therefore the first law he imposes upon his votaries is, to forbid all access to the way of the counsels, and to stifle all life of adoration, expiation, and prayer. For he well knows that, though a nation may appear to be on the verge of its doom, there is yet hope for it as long as the best of its sons are prostrate before the Majesty of God.
Look at the history of the west in the eleventh century. If there ever was a time when it seemed urgent that the cloister, far from increasing the number of its inmates, should send them forth to the last man, for the active service of the Church; it was surely the epoch when the flesh, victorious over the spirit, posted up its triumphs even in the sanctuary; when, for each other’s sake, Cæsar and satan held the pastors of the people in bondage. Nevertheless, at that very time, not only Cluny became the stronghold of Christianity, but Camaldoli, Vallombrosa, the charterhouse, and finally Citeaux, were founded and grew strong; so great was the demand even in the monastic life itself, for still closer retreat, by souls athirst for immolation and penance. And yet, so far from complaining of being abandoned, the world reckoned amongs its most glorious deliverers Romuald, John Gualbert, Bruno, and Robert of Molesmes. Moreover the century was great in the faith, and in that energy of faith which knew how to apply fire and steel to the festering wounds of humanity; great in the uprightness wherewith it recognized the necessity of expiation for such crying evils. Society, represented by its choicest members before the feet of God, received new life from Him.
This feast, then, is the world’s homage to one of its greatest benefactors. The legend of the breviary is short; but the reader may learn more about our saints by having recourse to his works; his letters, breathing the fragrance of solitude, and written in the beautiful style known to the monks of that heroic age, and his commentaries on St. Paul and on the psalms, which are clear and concise, revealing at once his science and his love of Jesus and of the Church.
According to the custom of the time, the breve depositionis announcing his death was sent round form church to church, and returned covered with testimonies of universal veneration. Nevertheless his disciples were more intent on imitating his holiness, than on having it recognized by the apostolic See. Four centuries after his death, Leo X without any process, on the simple evidence of the cause, authorized the Carthusians to pay public honor to their father. A hundred years later, in 1622, Gregory XV extended his feast to the entire world.
The following is the legend given in the holy liturgy.
Quote:Bruno, the founder of the Carthusian Order, was born at Cologne, and from his very cradle gave great promise of future sanctity. Favored by divine grace, the gravity of his character made him shun all childishness; so that, even at that age, one might have foreseen in him the future father of monks and restorer of the anachoretical life. His parents, who were distinguished for virtue and nobility, sent him to Paris, where he made great progress in philosophy and theology, and took the degrees of doctor and master in both faculties. Soon after this, he was, for his remarkable virtue, appointed to a canonry in the church of Rheims.
After some years, Bruno, with six of his friends, renounced the world, and betook himself to Hugh, bishop of Grenoble. On learning the cause of their coming, the bishop understood that they had been signified by the seven stars he had seen falling at his feet in his dream of the previous night. He therefore made over to them some wild mountains called the Chartreuse, belonging to his diocese, and himself conducted them thither. After having there led an eremitical life for several years, Bruno was summoned to Rome by Urban II who had been his disciple. In the great trials through which the Church was then passing, the Pontiff gladly availed himself of the saint’s prudence and knowledge for some years, until Bruno, refusing the archbishopric of Reggio, obtained leave to retire.
Attracted by the love of solitude he went to a desert place near Squillace in Calabria. Count Roger of Calabria was one day hunting, when his dogs began to bark round the saint’s cave. The Count entered and found Bruno at his prayers, and was so struck by his holiness, that thenceforward he greatly honored him and his companions and supplied their wants. His generosity met with its reward. A little later, when this same Count Roger was besieging Capua, and Sergius, an officer of his guard, had determined to betray him, Bruno, who was still living in his desert, appeared to the Count in sleep, revealed the whole treason to him, and thus saved him from imminent peril. At length, full of virtues and merits, and as renowned for holiness as for learning, Bruno fell asleep in our Lord, and was buried in the monastery of St. Stephen built by Count Roger, where he is great honored to this day.
Bless, O Bruno, the grateful joy of God’s children. With their whole hearts they acquiesce in the judgment of their mother the Church, when, among the beautiful, rich fruit trees in our Lord’s garden, she hides not her predilection for those whose silent shade attracts the preference of her divine Spouse. “Show me, O Thou whom my soul loveth, where Thou feedest, where Thou liest in the midday, lest I begin to wander after the flocks of Thy companions.” Thus speaks the bride in the sacred Canticle. And hearing the divine answer extolling the better part, thou minglest thy voice with the song of our Lord and the Church, saying: “O solitude and silence of the desert; hidden joy; good things unknown to the multitude, but known to the valiant! There are the young shoots of virtue carefully cultivated: there labor and rest are one and the same, and are nourished with fruits of paradise. There the eye acquires that look, which wounds the Bridegroom’s heart, and that which beholds God. There is Rachel in all her beauty, more loved by Jacob than Lia, although less fruitful; and her sons, Joseph and Benjamin, are their father’s favorites.
Thy sons cherish, in their hereditary peace, this privilege of the perfect even in these days of feverish excitement. Simple as themselves is the history of their Order; full of the supernatural, yet seeming to eschew the marvelous and the miraculous; while the heroism of all is so great, that very few stand out from the rest as remarkable for sanctity. Preserve this thine own spirit in thy children, O Bruno; and make us profit by their example. For their life silently preaches to the world the apostle’s doctrine: “Concerning spiritual things … I show unto you yet a more excellent way. If I speak with the tongues of men and of angels, and have not charity … if I should have prophecy, and know all mysteries and all knowledge, and if I should have all faith, so that I could remove mountains … and if I should distribute all my goods to feed the poor, if I should deliver my body to be burned, and have not charity, it profiteth me nothing. Charity never falleth away: whether prophecies shall be made void, or tongues shall cease, or knowledge shall be destroyed. Do not become children in sense; but in malice be children, and in sense be perfect.”
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| Holiness of Life by St. Bonaventure |
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Posted by: Stone - 10-06-2021, 07:07 AM - Forum: Resources Online
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Holiness of Life
by Saint Bonaventure
Translated by Laurence Costello O.F.M. 1923 by B. Herder Book Company, US.
![[Image: ?u=https%3A%2F%2Ftse4.explicit.bing.net%...%3DApi&f=1]](https://external-content.duckduckgo.com/iu/?u=https%3A%2F%2Ftse4.explicit.bing.net%2Fth%3Fid%3DOIP.tEAGw8K71XpV6Rz9W7sT9wHaJa%26pid%3DApi&f=1)
TABLE OF CONTENTS
PREFACE
CHAPTER I: TRUE SELF-KNOWLEDGE
CHAPTER II: TRUE HUMILITY
CHAPTER III: PERFECT POVERTY
CHAPTER IV: SILENCE
CHAPTER V: THE PRACTICE OF PRAYER
CHAPTER VI: THE REMEMBRANCE OF CHRIST’S PASSION
CHAPTER VII: THE PERFECT LOVE OF GOD
CHAPTER VIII: FINAL PERSEVERANCE
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| Woman dies of degenerative brain disorder after COVID jab, sparking fears of long-term side effects |
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Posted by: Stone - 10-06-2021, 06:43 AM - Forum: COVID Vaccines
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Woman dies of degenerative brain disorder after COVID jab, sparking fears of long-term side effects
‘The findings suggest that regulatory approval, even under an Emergency Use Authorization, for COVID vaccines was premature and that widespread use should be halted until full long-term safety studies evaluating prion toxicity have been completed.’
Tue Oct 5, 2021
(LifeSiteNews) — A woman has died of a rare brain disease only three months after receiving her second Pfizer shot. Her medical team suspects a connection between the disease that caused her death and the mRNA vaccine.
Cheryl Cohen was a healthy 64-year-old from Florida who received her second dose of the Pfizer vaccine back in April. Soon after that, she started exhibiting symptoms of a rare degenerative brain disorder known as Creuzfeldt-Jakob Disease (CJD). After a three-months-long struggle, Cheryl passed away on July 22. Her daughter Giani Cohen described her mom’s ordeal in an exclusive interview with the Defender.
Cheryl started showing her first symptoms of CJD in May, less than two weeks after receiving her second dose of the Pfizer vaccine. According to her daughter Giani, she experienced severe headaches and “brain fog.”
“She had extreme brain fog and confusion. She couldn’t remember where she was driving and got really scared.”
At the end of May, Cheryl was hospitalized, though at first, doctors could not figure out what the problem was. After MRI imaging of her brain showed evidence of prion disease, her doctors performed two lumbar punctures, the second one of which enabled them to diagnose CJD. Ten days after receiving her diagnosis on July 12, Cheryl Cohen died.
“We didn’t know what to do,” Giani told the Defender. “It’s fatal. There’s no repairing what was going on. It’s like fast-acting dementia. It was a really sad thing, so scary, so insane and something [her] doctors hadn’t seen before.”
“It was literally like watching something eat her brain alive,” Giani added.
Before she died, Cheryl was able to confide in her daughter that she believed the vaccine was responsible.
“While shaking, she managed to get out the words, ‘This is ****ing stupid.’”
“I said, ‘Mom, is this the vaccine?’ and she said, ‘yep.’”
Giani believed her mother, like so many others, felt pressured by her job and the media to get vaccinated. She was surprised to learn that her mother had taken the vaccine, as she came from an anti-vaxxer family.
Cheryl’s physician, Dr. Andrea Folds from Aventura Hospital, also believes the COVID-19 vaccine to have been the cause of the prion disease. He provided the Defender with the following written statement:
Quote:This case identifies potential adverse events that could occur with the administration of the novel COVID-19 vaccine. Moreover, clinicians need to consider neurodegenerative diseases such as prion disease (e.g. sporadic Creutzfeldt-Jakob disease), autoimmune encephalitis, infection, non-epileptic seizure, toxic-metabolic disorders, etc. in their differential diagnoses when a patient presents with rapidly progressive dementia, particularly in the setting of recent vaccination.
Although there is currently no cure for sporadic Creutzfeldt-Jakob disease (sCJD), early diagnosis is crucial to avoid the unnecessary administration of empiric medications for suspected psychological or neurological disorders.
More importantly, recognizing adverse effects provides individuals with vital information to make a more educated decision regarding their health.
Prion diseases such as CJD, Parkinson’s and Alzheimer’s are caused by pathogenic agents known as prions which, according to the CDC’s website, “are able to induce abnormal folding of specific proteins called prion proteins which are abundantly found in the brain. The abnormal folding of the prion proteins leads to brain damage and the characteristic signs and symptoms of the disease.”
Two recent studies published by immunologist J. Bart Classen in February and July show that mRNA vaccines could trigger prion disease in vaccinated patients. Evidence put forward by Classen in his papers indicates that the vaccine spike protein can induce misfolding of essential binding proteins called TDP-43 and FUS, causing them to “assume toxic configurations.”
Classen conducted his study on both the Pfizer and AstraZeneca vaccines and concluded that both have the ability to cause prion disease. He advised that the vaccination be halted until risks of vaccine-induced prion disease can be further assessed. He wrote, “The findings suggest that regulatory approval, even under an Emergency Use Authorization, for COVID vaccines was premature and that widespread use should be halted until full long-term safety studies evaluating prion toxicity have been completed.”
Another possibility is that the vaccines could accelerate prion disease already in progression within certain individuals. It normally takes years or even decades for prions to induce misfolding of prion-proteins in the brain, but the COVID vaccines could be accelerating this process.
Classen also stressed the importance of reporting cases of possible vaccine-induced prion disease but warned that reporting is likely to fail for diseases that develop over longer periods of time, as he notes that “essentially none of the adverse events occurring years or decades after administration of a pharmaceutical are ever reported.”
CJD gained somber notoriety back in the 1990s and early 2000s when its bovine variant, BSE (bovine spongiform encephalopathy), caused an epidemic of what is commonly referred to as “madcow disease” in Great Britain and parts of continental Europe. The disease was proven to be entirely man-made as the practice of feeding meat-and-bone meals to cattle was shown to have been at the origin of the pandemic among bovines.
This practice was subsequently banned, though by then it was far too late, as potentially millions of individuals in the U.K. had already been exposed to contaminated meat. The U.K. government at the time not only failed to stop the infected meat from getting into the human food chain but also neglected to alert the public of the potential danger, claiming that the beef was “safe.” John Gummer, the U.K. minister of agriculture at the time, even went as far as having himself photographed by the national media feeding his own daughter a beef burger.
The affair remains to this day the biggest food scandal in history as more than two hundred people have died as a result of the illness since then, and scientists have warned that hundreds more could die in the next few years. It is impossible to say how many people currently carry the disease as it remains undetectable before the onset of symptoms and the incubation period can last for several decades. Early symptoms include behavioral changes, confusion, and memory loss, and in the later stage, patients exhibit dementia, poor coordination, and involuntary movements.
The disease is incurable and always fatal, with death usually occurring from a few months to a year after the first appearance of symptoms. The U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) has imposed a ban on blood donations from anyone who has spent more than six months in Great Britain from 1980 to 1997 because of the possible risk of transmitting the human form of BSE through blood transfusions.
If the recent studies by Bart Classen prove true, the vaccination of millions of individuals with the Pfizer and AstraZeneca vaccines could trigger a new wave of prion disease and cause a similar scandal.
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| AG Garland "Weaponizes" DoJ Against Dissenting Parents After School Board Association Pleas |
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Posted by: Stone - 10-05-2021, 07:20 AM - Forum: Socialism & Communism
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AG Garland "Weaponizes" DoJ Against Dissenting Parents After School Board Association Pleas
ZH [Emphasis in the original.] | OCT 05, 2021
One day after a North Carolina school board adopted a policy that would discipline or dismiss teachers if they incorporate critical race theory (CRT) into their teaching of the history of the United States, The Epoch Times' Ivan Pentchoukov reports that Attorney General Merrick Garland on Oct. 4 announced a concentrated effort to target any threats of violence, intimidation, and harassment by parents toward school personnel.
The announcement also comes days after a national association of school boards asked the Biden administration to take “extraordinary measures” to prevent alleged threats against school staff that the association said was coming from parents who oppose mask mandates and the teaching of critical race theory.
Garland directed the FBI and U.S. attorneys in the next 30 days to convene meetings with federal, state, and local leaders within 30 days to “facilitate the discussion of strategies for addressing threats against school administrators, board members, teachers, and staff,” according to a letter (pdf) the attorney general sent on Monday to all U.S. attorneys, the FBI director, the director of the Executive Office of U.S. Attorneys, and the assistant attorney general of the DOJ’s criminal division.
According to the DOJ, further efforts will be rolled out in the coming days, including a task force that will determine how to use federal resources to prosecute offending parents as well as how to advise state entities on prosecutions in cases where no federal law is broken. The Justice Department will also provide training to school staff on how to report threats from parents and preserve evidence to aid in investigation and prosecution.
Quote:“In recent months, there has been a disturbing spike in harassment, intimidation, and threats of violence against school administrators, board members, teachers, and staff who participate in the vital work of running our nation’s public schools,” Garland wrote.
“While spirited debate about policy matters is protected under our Constitution, that protection does not extend to threats of violence or efforts to intimidate individuals based on their views.”
School boards across the nation have increasingly become an arena for heated debate over culture, politics, and health. Parents groups have ramped up pressure on boards over the teaching of critical race theory and the imposition of mask mandates. The debate is split sharply along political lines, with Democrats largely in favor of critical race theory and mask mandates, and Republicans opposing both.
The amount and severity of the threats against officials are not known, but Garland’s letter suggests the phenomenon is widespread.
Full AG Garland Statement (with our thoughts):
Quote:MEMORANDUM FOR DIRECTOR, FEDERAL BUREAU OF INVESTIGATION;
DIRECTOR, EXECUTIVE OFFICE FOR U.S. ATTORNEYS ASSISTANT ATTORNEY GENERAL, CRIMINAL DIVISION UNITED STATES ATTORNEYS
FROM: THE ATTORNEY GENERAL
SUBJECT: PARTNERSHIP AMONG FEDERAL, STATE, LOCAL, TRIBAL, AND TERRITORIAL LAW ENFORCEMENT TO ADDRESS THREATS AGAINST SCHOOL ADMINISTRATORS, BOARD MEMBERS, TEACHERS, AND STAFF
In recent months, there has been a disturbing spike in harassment, intimidation, and threats of violence against school administrators, board members, teachers, and staff who participate in the vital work of running our nation's public schools. While spirited debate about policy matters is protected under our Constitution, that protection does not extend to threats of violence or efforts to intimidate individuals based on their views.
[ZH: But intimidating parents who dare to have the view that the nation's founding fathers and the founding documents are not in fact systemically racist and does not want their children taught that is the case is ok?]
Threats against public servants are not only illegal, they run counter to our nation's core values. Those who dedicate their time and energy to ensuring that our children receive a proper education in a safe environment deserve to he able to do their work without fear for their safety.
[ZH: "Dedication" to a "proper education" is admirable; indoctrination in Marxism is not]
The Department takes these incidents seriously and is committed to using its authority and resources to discourage these threats, identify them when they occur, and prosecute them when appropriate. In the coming days, the Department will announce a series of measures designed to address the rise in criminal conduct directed toward school personnel.
[ZH: What exactly is the crime?]
Coordination and partnership with local law enforcement is critical to implementing these measures for the benefit of our nation's nearly 14,000 public school districts. To this end, I am directing the Federal Bureau of Investigation, working with each United States Attorney, to convene meetings with federal, state, local, Tribal, and territorial leaders in each federal judicial district within 30 days of the issuance of this memorandum. These meetings will facilitate the discussion of strategies for addressing threats against school administrators, board members, teachers, and staff, and will open dedicated lines of communication for threat reporting, assessment, and response.
[ZH: We wonder how many local law enforcement officials, while busily watching for vaccine passport offenders, and mask-mandate refusers, will acquiesce to enforcing these new laws to protect the very people who are preaching that America's systemic racism starts with the men (and women) in blue?]
The Department is steadfast in its commitment to protect all people in the United States from violence, threats of violence, and other forms of intimidation and harassment.
[ZH: Presumably intimidation and emotional harassment of young white boys and girls for their 'whiteness', privilege, and systemic racism is beyond that 'protection'?]
As Chris Rufo (@RealChrisRufo) tweeted: "The Biden administration is rapidly repurposing federal law enforcement to target political opposition."
Rufo goes on to note that:
"Neither the Attorney General's memo nor the full Justice Department press release cites any significant, credible threat. This is a blatant suppression tactic, designed to dissuade citizens from participating in the democratic process at school boards."
Parents have led the charge against controversial issues such as Critical Race Theory (CRT), masking mandates and vaccine requirements.
CRT holds that America is fundamentally racist, yet it teaches people to view every social interaction and person in terms of race. Its adherents pursue “antiracism” through the end of merit, objective truth and the adoption of race-based policies.
In Loudoun County, Virginia, two parents were arrested in June for trespassing while protesting CRT and a transgender policy at the school district because they refused to leave the rowdy meeting that was declared an unlawful assembly.
In July, a man was arrested at a school board meeting and charged with a felony because a gun reportedly fell out of his pocket, the Indianapolis Star reported.
In Utah, 11 anti-mask protestors were arrested on misdemeanor charges for allegedly disrupting a school board meeting in May, the Salt Lake Tribune reported. The protestors entered the school board meeting and shouted obscenities, which resulted in an early end to the meeting.
Senator Tom Cotton (@SenTomCotton) tweeted his thoughts:"Parents are speaking out against Critical Race Theory in schools. Now the Biden administration is cracking down on dissent."
Just this week, Ron Paul explained why it is so important for parents to control the education of their children:
Quote:During last week’s Virginia gubernatorial debate, Democratic candidate Terry McAuliffe promised that as governor he would prevent parents from removing sexually explicit books from school libraries, because he doesn't think “parents should be telling schools what they should teach.”
McAuliffe's disdain for parents who think they should have some say in their children’s education is shared by most “progressives,” as well as some who call themselves conservatives. They think parents should obediently pay the taxes to fund the government schools and never question any aspect of the government school program.
School officials' refusal to obey the wishes of parents extends to the anti-science mask mandates. Mask mandates are not only useless in protecting children from a virus they are at low risk of becoming sick from or transmitting, the mandated mask-wearing actually makes children sick! Yet school administrators refuse to follow the science if that means listening to parents instead of the so-called experts.
Replacing parental control with government control of education (and other aspects of child raising) has been a goal of authoritarians since Plato. After all, it is much easier to ensure obedience if someone has been raised to think of the government as the source of all wisdom and truth, as well as the provider of all of life’s necessities.
In contrast to an authoritarian society, a free society recognizes that parents have both the responsibility and the right to provide their children with a quality education that reflects the parents’ values. Teachers who use their positions to indoctrinate children in beliefs that contradict the views of the parents are the ones overstepping their bounds.
Restoring parental control of education should be a priority for all who believe in liberty. If government can override the wishes of parents in the name of “education” or “protecting children’s health” then what area of our lives is safe from government intrusion?
Fortunately, growing dissatisfaction with government schools is leading many parents to try to change school policies.
"It is shameful that activists are weaponizing the US Department of Justice against parents,” Nicole Neily, president of Parents Defending Education told the Daily Caller News Foundation in response to the memorandum.
“This is a coordinated attempt to intimidate dissenting voices in the debates surrounding America’s underperforming K-12 education – and it will not succeed. We will not be silenced.”
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| October 5th – St. Placid and His Companions, Martyrs |
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Posted by: Stone - 10-05-2021, 06:40 AM - Forum: October
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October 5 – St. Placid and His Companions, Martyrs
The protomartyr of the Benedictine Order stands before us today in his strength and his beauty. The empire had fallen, and the yoke of the Arian Goths lay heavy upon Italy. Rome was no longer in the hands of the glorious races, which had made her greatness; these, nevertheless, kept up their honorable traditions. They offered a great lesson for future times of revolution to other descendants of not less noble families: in lieu of the ensign of civic honor once committed to their fathers, the survivors of the old patrician ranks made it their duty to raise still higher the standard of true heroism, of those virtues which alone are everlasting. Thus Benedict of Nursia, fleeing into the desert, had rendered greater service than any mighty conqueror to Rome and her immortal destinies. The world soon discovered this fact; and then began, as St. Gregory tells us, the concourse of Roman nobles, bringing their children to the Patriarch of monks, to be educated by him for Almighty God.
Placid was the eldest son of the patrician Tertullus. The excellent qualities early discovered in the child led his worthy father to offer to God, without delay, this dear first-fruit of his paternity. In those days, parents loved their children not for this passing world, but for eternity; not for themselves, but for our Lord. The faith of Tertullus was well rewarded when, twenty years later, not only his first-born, but also his two other sons and their sister, were crowned with martyrdom. This was not the first holocaust of the kind in that heroic family, if it be true that they were relatives by blood and heirs of the goods as well as the virtues, of the holy Eustace, who had been immolated four centuries earlier with his wife and sons.
Among the children of promise enlisted by the vanquished nobles of the ancient empire in the new militia of the holy Valley, Equitus brought to Subiaco his son Maurus, a boy some years older than Placid. Henceforth the names of Maurus and Placid became inseparable from that of Benedict; and the Patriarch acquired a new glory from his two sons, so united and yet so different.
Equal in their love of their master and father, and themselves equally loved by him for their equal fidelity in good works, they experienced to the full that delight in virtue which makes its practice a second nature. However similar their zeal in using “the most strong and bright armor of obedience” in the service of Christ the King, it was wonderful to see the master accommodating himself to the age of his disciples; so adapting himself to their differences of character that there was nothing precipitate, nothing forced, in his education. It disciplined nature without crushing it, and followed the Holy Ghost without endeavoring to take the lead. In Maurus was especially reproduced Benedict’s austere gravity; in Placid his simplicity and sweetness. Benedict took Maurus to witness the chastisement inflicted on the wandering monk, who could not stay at prayer; but Placid accompanied him to the mountain-top, where his prayer obtained a spring of water to deliver from danger and fatigue the brethren dwelling on the rocks above the Anio. But when, walking along the riverside, holding Placid by the hand and leaning upon Maurus, the legislator of monks explained to them the code of perfection they were afterwards to propagate, the Angels knew not which most to admire: the candor of the one, winning the father’s tenderest affection, or the precocious maturity of the other, meriting the holy patriarch’s confidence, and already sharing his burden.
Who does not recollect the admirable scene of Maurus walking on the water and saving Placid from drowning? Monastic traditions never weary of extolling the obedience of Maurus, Benedict’s humility, and the sagacious simplicity of the child pronouncing sentence as judge of the prodigy. Of such children the Master could say from experience: “The Lord oftentimes revealeth that which is best, to him that is the younger.” And we may well believe that the recollections of the holy Valley prompted him, later on, to lay down in his Rule this prescription: “In all places whatsoever, let not age be taken into account as regardeth order, neither let it be to the prejudice of anyone; for Samuel and David, while yet children, were judges over the elders.”
The following Lessons, taken from the Monastic Breviary, will complete the account of Placid’s life, and relate the manner of his death. In 1588, the discovery of the Martyr’s relics at Messina confirmed the truth of their Acts. On this occasion, Pope Sixtus V extended the celebration of their Feast under the rite of a simple, to the universal Church.
Quote:Placid, a Roman by birth and son of Tertullus, belonged to the noble family of the Anicii. Offered to God while still a child, he was entrusted to St. Benedict, and made such progress in sanctity and in the monastic life, as to become one of his principal disciples. He was present when the holy Father obtained from God by prayer a fountain of water in the solitude of Subiaco. While still a boy, being sent one day to draw water, he fell into the lake, but was miraculously saved by the monk Maurus, who at the command of the holy Father ran dry-shod over the water. Later on he accompanied St. Benedict to Monte Cassino. At the age of twenty-one, he was sent into Sicily, to defend, against certain covetous persons, the goods and lands which his father had given to Monte Cassino. On the way he performed so many great miracles, that he arrived at Messina with a reputation for sanctity. He built a monastery on his paternal estate, not far from the harbor, and gathered together thirty monks; being thus the first to introduce the monastic life into the island.
Nothing could be more placid or more humble than his behavior; while he surpassed everyone in prudence, gravity, kindness, and unruffled tranquility of mind. He often spent whole nights in the contemplation of heavenly things, only sitting down for a short time when overpowered by the necessity of sleep. He was most zealous in observing silence; and when it was necessary to speak, the subjects of his conversation were the contempt of the world and the imitation of Christ. His fasts were most severe, and he abstained all the year round from flesh and every kind of milk-meat. In Lent he took only bread and water on Tuesdays, Thursdays, and Sundays; the rest of the week he passed without any food. He never drank wine, and always wore a hairshirt. So numerous and so remarkable were the miracles he worked, that the sick came to him in crowds to be cured, not only from the neighborhood, but also Etruria and Afria. But Placid, in his great humility, worked all his miracles in the name of St. Benedict, attributing them to his merits.
In the fifth year after his arrival in Sicily, the Saracens made a sudden incursion, and seized upon Placid and his thirty monks while they were singing the Night Office in the church. At the same time were taken Eutychius and Victorinus, Placid’s brothers, and his sister the virgin Favia, who had all come from Rome to visit him; and also Donatus, Fanstus, and the deacon Firmatus. Donatus was beheaded on the spot. The rest were taken before Manucha, the chief of the pirates; and as they firmly refused to adore his idols, they were beaten with rods and cast, bound hand and foot, into prison, without food. Every day they were beaten afresh, but God supported them. After many days, they were again led before the tyrant; and as they still stood firm in the faith, they were again repeatedly beaten, then stripped of their clothes and hung, head downwards, over thick smoke to suffocate. They were left for dead, but the next day were found alive, and miraculously healed of their wounds.
The tyrant then addressed himself to the virgin Flavia apart. But finding he could gain nothing by threats or promises, he ordered her to be stripped, and hung by the feet from a high beam, insulting her meanwhile upon her nakedness. But the virgin answered: Man and woman have the same Author and Creator, God; hence neither my sex, nor this nakedness which I endure for love of him, will be any disadvantage to me in his eyes, who for my sake chose not only to be stripped, but also to be nailed to a cross. Manucha enraged at this reply ordered her to be beaten, and tortured with the smoke, and then handed her over to be dishonored. At the virgin’s prayer, God struck all who attempted to approach her, with sudden stiffness and pain in all their limbs. The tyrant next attacked Placis, the virgin’s brother, who tried to convince him of the vanity of his idols; Manucha thereupon commanded his mouth and teeth to be broken with stones, and his tongue to be cut out by the root; but the martyr spoke as clearly and easily as before. The barbarian grew more furious at this miracle, and commanded that Placis, with his sister and brethren should be crushed under an enormous weight of anchors and millstones; but even this torture was powerless to hurt them. Finally, thirty-six of Placid’s family, with their leader, and several others, were beheaded on the shore near Messina, and gained the palm of martyrdom on the third of the Nones of October, in the year of salvation five hundred and thirty-nine. Gordian, a monk of that monastery, who had escaped by flight, found all their bodies entire after several days, and buried them with tears. Not long afterwards the barbarians, in punishment of their crime, were swallowed up by the avenging waves of the sea.
Deign, O Placid, my beloved son, why should I weep for thee? Thou art taken from me, only that thou mayest belong to all men. I will give thanks for this sacrifice of the fruit of my heart, offered to Almighty God.” Thus, on hearing of this day’s triumph, spoke Benedict, thy spiritual father, mingling tears with his joy. He did not survive thee long; yet long enough to complete, of his own accord, the sacrifice of separations, by sending into far-off France the companion of thy childhood, Maurus, who was destined not to rejoin thee in heaven for so many long years. Charity seeketh not her own interests; she finds them by forgetting self, and losing self in God. Placid had disappeared; Maurus had been sent away; Benedict was about to die; human prudence would have believed the holy Patriarch’s work in danger of perishing; whereas at this critical moment, it strengthened its roots and extended its branches over the whole world. Unless the grain of wheat falling into the ground die, itself remaineth alone; but if it die, it bringeth forth much fruit. As heretofore the blood of martyrs was the seed of Christians, it now produced a rich harvest of monks.
Blessed be thou, O Placid, far beyond thy native Italy, and Sicily the scene of thy combat. Blessed be thou for the numberless ears of corn, for the abundant harvest sprung from the choice grain that fell to the earth on this day: faith bids us see in thy immolation the secret of the success granted to the monastic mission of Maurus. Thus, despite the great diversity and the unequal length of your paths in life, you are ever united in the heart of your master and father. At the appointed hour, he did not hesitate before the holocaust our Lord required of him; wherefore, he now in heaven beholds the fulfillment of the hopes he had centered in his two beloved sons.
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| PA House Legislator Introduces Forced Sterilization – Three-Child Limit Legislation |
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Posted by: Stone - 10-05-2021, 06:18 AM - Forum: General Commentary
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Pennsylvania House Democrat Introduces Forced Sterilization – Three-Child Limit Legislation
GP [emphasis mine]| October 4, 2021
Pennsylvania Democrat Christopher M. Rabb sent out a memorandum to all House members regarding his legislation that will enforce reproductive responsibility among men. The bill will force men to undergo vasectomies within 6 weeks from having their third child or their 40th birthday, whichever comes first.
This legislation includes a $10,000 reward to whoever snitches to the proper authority on those who have failed to submit to forced sterilization within the allotted time.
This bill will also include legal actions for unwanted pregnancies against inseminators who wrongfully conceive a child with them.
“As long as state legislatures continue to restrict the reproductive rights of cis women, trans men, and non-binary people, there should be laws that address the responsibility of men who impregnate them. Thus, my bill will also codify “wrongful conception” to include when a person has demonstrated negligence toward preventing conception during intercourse,” Rabb stated in his memorandum.
PA State Rep. David Rowe posted on his Facebook account regarding this horrendous bill:
Quote:If there was any doubt that today’s progressive left have utterly and completely disregarded your personal medical freedom, then let this be the nail in the coffin.
A legislator from Philadelphia has just introduced legislation that would limit how many children your family could have, dictate what age you could have a family, and would issue a TEN THOUSAND DOLLAR FINE for refusing to submit to forced sterilization after having three children. As a fourth-born child myself, I would have never existed under this law and neither would so many others.
This bill will never see the light of day as long as Republicans control the House, but I wanted you all to be aware how quickly policies that belong in Communist China would become the norm here if Democrats seized total control of State Government.
The left is pushing to make America a godless, communist country like their big boss China. This is utterly sickening population control and they do this while illegal immigrants and refugees are flooding across the open borders.
You can read the memorandum here: House Co-Sponsorship Memoranda – PA House of Representatives by Jim Hoft on Scribd
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| Project Veritas: Covid Vaccine Exposed - Part 4 |
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Posted by: Stone - 10-05-2021, 06:11 AM - Forum: COVID Vaccines
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Pfizer Scientist: ‘Your Antibodies are Probably Better than the Vaccination’
- Nick Karl, Pfizer Scientist: “When somebody is naturally immune -- like they got COVID -- they probably have more antibodies against the virus…When you actually get the virus, you’re going to start producing antibodies against multiple pieces of the virus…So, your antibodies are probably better at that point than the [COVID] vaccination.”
- Chris Croce, Pfizer Senior Associate Scientist: “You’re protected for longer” if you have natural COVID antibodies compared to the COVID vaccine.
- Croce: “I work for an evil corporation…Our organization is run on COVID money.”
- Rahul Khandke, Pfizer Scientist: “If you have [COVID] antibodies built up, you should be able to prove that you have those built up.”
[NEW YORK – Oct. 4, 2021] Project Veritas released the fourth video in its COVID vaccine investigative series today which exposed three Pfizer officials saying that antibodies lead to equal, if not better, protection against the virus compared to the vaccine.
Nick Karl, a scientist who is directly involved in the production of Pfizer’s COVID vaccine, said that natural immunity is more effective than the very vaccine he works on, and Pfizer produces.
Quote:“When somebody is naturally immune -- like they got COVID -- they probably have more antibodies against the virus…When you actually get the virus, you’re going to start producing antibodies against multiple pieces of the virus…So, your antibodies are probably better at that point than the [COVID] vaccination,” Karl said. Notwithstanding, Karl still believes that vaccine mandates are positive for society.
“The city [of New York] needs like vax cards and everything. It’s just about making it so inconvenient for unvaccinated people to the point where they're just like, ‘F*** it. I’ll get it.’ You know?”
A second Pfizer official, Senior Associate Scientist, Chris Croce, corroborated Karl’s assertion about COVID immunity derivative of antibodies:
Quote:Veritas Journalist: “So, I am well-protected [with antibodies]?”
Chris Croce, Pfizer Senior Associate Scientist: “Yeah.”
Veritas Journalist: “Like as much as the vaccine?”
Croce: “Probably more.”
Veritas Journalist: “How so? Like, how much more?”
Croce: “You're protected most likely for longer since there was a natural response.”
Croce expressed dismay with his company’s direction and moral compass:
Veritas Journalist: “So, what happened to the monoclonal antibody treatments?”
Croce: “[It got] pushed to the side.”
Veritas Journalist: “Why?”
Croce: “Money. It's disgusting.”
…
Croce: “I still feel like I work for an evil corporation because it comes down to profits in the end. I mean, I'm there to help people, not to make millions and millions of dollars. So, I mean, that's the moral dilemma.”
Veritas Journalist: “Isn’t it billions and billions?”
Croce: “I’m trying to be nice.”
Veritas Journalist: “No, I hear you. I hear you. I do. I mean, I’ll still give you a hard time about it.”
Croce: “Basically, our organization is run on COVID money now.”
The third Pfizer scientist, Rahul Khandke, admitted his company demands that its employees keep information from the public.
Quote:“We're bred and taught to be like, ‘vaccine is safer than actually getting COVID.’ Honestly, we had to do so many seminars on this. You have no idea. Like, we have to sit there for hours and hours and listen to like -- be like, ‘you cannot talk about this in public,’” Khandke said.
Khandke also signaled that proof of antibodies is on par with proof of vaccination.
Quote:“If you have [COVID] antibodies built up, you should be able to prove that you have those built up,” he said.
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| Pope’s Swiss Guards Resign Over Mandatory COVID-19 Vaccination |
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Posted by: Stone - 10-04-2021, 02:31 PM - Forum: COVID Passports
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Pope’s Swiss Guards Resign Over Mandatory COVID-19 Vaccination
Three others suspended for not taking the jab.
![[Image: 041021guards1.jpg]](https://cdn.summit.news/2021/10/041021guards1.jpg)
Summit News[emphasis mine] | 4 October, 2021
Three Swiss Guards have resigned and three others have been suspended after refusing to comply with a Vatican mandate that they get the COVID-19 vaccination.
The Swiss Guards, colloquially known as the Pope’s bodyguards, had previously been ordered “to protect their health and that of the others they come into contact with as part of their service” by getting the jab.
The mandate was part of a broader instruction to all Vatican employees to get the COVID shot or face losing their jobs.
“Besides the three guardsmen sent back to Switzerland, at least three others were suspended from active duty after they agreed to vaccinate but have yet to receive their jabs,” reports RT.
The fact that there is no religious exemption against taking the vaccine within the Vatican tells you everything you need to know about the Vatican and the Pope.
Pope Francis has repeatedly amplified pro-vaccination narratives and refused to extend any understanding to Catholics who are hesitant to take the jab.
The Pontifical Academy for Life, the official bioethics academy of the Catholic Church, has also insisted that it is a “moral responsibility” for Catholics to take the vaccine.
“The Vatican has said that it considers it acceptable for Catholics to use vaccines, even those that use stem cell lines from aborted fetuses in their research,” reported the Mail.
The Italian government has also passed a decree applying to both the private and public sector ordering companies to withhold pay from workers who refuse to take the COVID-19 vaccine.
Those found working without the pass face fines of up to €1,500 euros after it was extended as a condition of entry for museums, stadiums, pubs, restaurants, and schools.
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| Channeling Pachamama Two Years Later: Pope, Faith Leaders urge Nations to Care for Creation |
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Posted by: Stone - 10-04-2021, 10:44 AM - Forum: Pope Francis
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It was two years ago today that the Pachamama was 'honored' at the Vatican grounds. It appears that Pope Francis is channeling that infamous event by promoting veneration for the Earth at a meeting today at the Vatican, supposedly in anticipation of a November U.N. Climate Summit:
Pope, faith leaders urge nations at climate summit to care for creation
![[Image: Capture.png]](https://i.postimg.cc/MH6Ps2vx/Capture.png)
October 4, 2021
VATICAN CITY (CNS [click on link to see all 25 pictures from this event) -- High-level representatives of the world's religions came together with Pope Francis at the Vatican to show their joint commitment to caring for the Earth and to appeal to world leaders to deepen their commitments to mitigating climate change.
To the strains of Antonio Vivaldi's "The Four Seasons" and surrounded by potted greenery and the colorful frescoes of the Hall of Benedictions, nearly 40 faith leaders signed a joint appeal that Pope Francis then blessed and gave to Alok Sharma, president-designate of COP26, and to Luigi Di Maio, Italy's foreign affairs minister.
"Future generations will never forgive us if we miss the opportunity to protect our common home. We have inherited a garden: We must not leave a desert to our children," said the written appeal, signed Oct. 4, the feast of St. Francis of Assisi, patron saint of ecology.
The appeal urged world leaders, who will meet at the 26th U.N. Climate Change Conference of Parties -- COP26 -- in Glasgow Nov. 1-12, "to take speedy, responsible and shared action to safeguard, restore and heal our wounded humanity and the home entrusted to our stewardship."
Participants included top scientists and major religious leaders including: Ecumenical Patriarch Bartholomew of Constantinople; Anglican Archbishop Justin Welby of Canterbury, England; Russian Orthodox Metropolitan Hilarion of Volokolamsk, representing Patriarch Kirill of Moscow; Sheikh Ahmad el-Tayeb, grand imam of Al-Azhar; Rabbi Noam Marans of the International Jewish Committee for Interreligious Consultations; and top representatives of other Christian denominations, Sunni and Shi'a Muslim communities, Judaism, Hinduism, Sikhism, Buddhism, Confucianism, Taoism, Zoroastrianism and Jainism.
The appeal called on nations to: increase their levels of commitment and international cooperation; meet net-zero carbon emissions as soon as possible as part of efforts to mitigate rising global average temperatures; step up climate action at home and financially assist more vulnerable countries in adapting to and addressing climate change; increase their transition to cleaner energy and sustainable land use practices; and promote environmentally friendly food systems and the rights of indigenous peoples and local communities.
The religious leaders also pledged that they themselves would promote ecological education; advocate for a "change of heart" in their own communities concerning caring for all of creation; encourage sustainable lifestyles; take part in public debates on environmental issues; and support "greening" their institutions, properties and investments.
They symbolically marked their personal commitment by pouring a cup of soil onto a potted olive tree that will be planted in the Vatican Gardens.
The representatives took to the floor with a brief speech, commentary or declaration, with many detailing what their faith tradition teaches about the moral imperative of caring for humanity's common home. At the end of the ceremony, recorded messages and appeals were played from those religious leaders that could not attend the event due to pandemic restrictions.
Saying he wanted to leave more time to hear from everyone, Pope Francis chose to skip reading his speech aloud since everyone had a written copy.
In the full text, the pope said COP26 "represents an urgent summons to provide effective responses to the unprecedented ecological crisis and the crisis of values that we are presently experiencing, and in this way to offer concrete hope to future generations."
He proposed "three concepts" to guide their joint efforts: "openness to interdependence and sharing; the dynamism of love; and the call to respect."
"Recognizing that the world is interconnected means not only realizing the harmful effects of our actions, but also identifying behaviors and solutions to be adopted, in an attitude of openness to interdependence" and sharing the responsibility and ways to care for others and the environment, he wrote.
Religious and spiritual traditions can help promote love, which "creates bonds and expands existence, for it draws people out of themselves and toward others," especially the poor, he wrote.
Faith traditions, he said, can help break down "barriers of selfishness," counter today's "throwaway culture" and combat the "seeds of conflict: greed, indifference, ignorance, fear, injustice, insecurity and violence," which harm people and the planet.
"We can face this challenge" with personal examples, action and education, the pope wrote.
Finally, the pope wrote, there must be respect for creation, respect for others, "for ourselves and for the creator, but also mutual respect between faith and science."
Respect, he wrote, is "an empathetic and active experience of desiring to know others and to enter into dialogue with them, in order to walk together on a common journey."
The meeting, "Faith and Science: Toward COP26," was organized by the embassies of the United Kingdom and Italy to the Holy See, together with the Vatican. The U.K. and Italy were co-chairing the summit in Glasgow, where parties from 197 nations are meant to find agreement on how to tackle the threat of climate change.
The appeal of religious leaders and scientists came after months of dialogue and agreement that there is a common moral duty to tackle climate change.
The COP26 co-chairs wanted to include the voices of religious leaders given the moral and ethical imperative of environmental protection, but also because of their global reach and authority as they represent an estimated 84% of the world's population who identify with a faith.
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| Archbishop Viganò: Statement on the Recent Imposition of Compulsory Vaccinations |
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Posted by: Stone - 10-04-2021, 09:54 AM - Forum: Archbishop Viganò
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God willing, one day Archbishop Viganò will recognize the 'original canceled priests' of the 1970's and then of the [true] SSPX-Resistance since 2012!
Statement Regarding the Recent Imposition of Compulsory Vaccinations in Some American Dioceses
We have learned that in some dioceses in the United States of America, and in particular in the Archdiocese of Chicago, the Ecclesiastical Authority is imposing on its clerics and pastoral workers the vaccination requirement as a condition for attending celebrations, liturgical and pastoral activities and even for the mere fact of being priests with a ministry. Similar despotic measures are also imposed in Italy and other countries.
Priests who do not comply with the Ordinary's orders will be deprived of their priestly faculties and means of subsistence. As a result, many churches will be closed to the great detriment of the Salus animarum, due to the lack of clerics which makes it impossible to replace those who do not allow themselves to be injected with the experimental gene serum. From what we know, there are quite a few pastors of souls who will display, as is their full right as citizens and Catholics, a clear refusal to sacrilegious and illegitimate provisions, which are null and void and expose those concerned to the real danger of serious side effects, including the risk of death. Not to mention the moral implications of accepting the inoculation of a drug for the production of which foetal cell lines from abortions are used.
The subservience of the Bergoglian Hierarchy to the pandemic farce and the imposition of so-called vaccination has turned the Ministers of God into pandemic gurus, the bishops into experimental serum peddlers and the entire Church body into the victims of mass experimentation. This constitutes an unprecedented betrayal of the divine mission of Christ's Church, the power of the Pastors and the mandate of the priests, in a process of replacing revealed Religion with a pseudo-scientific cult bordering on idolatry. If these abuses are already serious when they come from civil authority - whose corruption and conflicts of interest are now universally known and denounced - even more serious is the cooperation in this global crime by ecclesiastical authority.
In the face of such violations of law, the deliberate complicity of the Hierarchy in the diabolical globalist plan of the Great Reset must be denounced without hesitation, and this abuse of power ratified by the Holy See must be resisted firmly and courageously.
I strongly renew the appeal I made at the recent event in Dubuque (Iowa) in favour of the Coalition for Canceled Priests, inviting the laity to support their priests with coordinated initiatives. An International Foundation needs to be set up to collect offerings and donations from the faithful, diverting them from parishes and dioceses that are conniving with the current Bergoglian regime. When the Bishops see their bank accounts touched, they will probably be induced to moderate their ostracism of good priests. Initiatives like Coalition for Canceled Priests and other similar projects are an urgent necessity in this hour of persecution. Each of us, according to our means, can make a concrete contribution - not necessarily only financial - by simply directing our donations to those who deserve them and not to those who use them to harass good clerics.
The Catholic faithful should open their homes to the priests persecuted by the tyranny of the bishops allied to globalism, making them available for the celebration of the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass. Gathered around these domestic altars, the refractory communities will thus be able to continue to render due worship to the Most Holy Trinity and benefit from the spiritual assistance of their Ministers. And may fraternal charity, nourished by the sharing of the one Faith and prayer, mark the beginning of a rebirth of the Holy Church, today obscured by mercenaries and traitors.
+ Carlo Maria Viganò, Archbishop, former Apostolic Nuncio to the United States
3 October 2021
Dominica XIX Post Pentecostem
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| The Life of St. Francis of Assisi by St. Bonaventure |
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Posted by: Stone - 10-04-2021, 06:45 AM - Forum: Resources Online
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THE LIFE OF SAINT FRANCIS OF ASSISI
by Saint Bonaventure
Translated by E. Gurney Salter 1904 by E.P. Dutton, New York, US.
![[Image: ?u=http%3A%2F%2F3.bp.blogspot.com%2F_VDo...f=1&nofb=1]](https://external-content.duckduckgo.com/iu/?u=http%3A%2F%2F3.bp.blogspot.com%2F_VDoidtH9tt4%2FTKqIeEoK_fI%2FAAAAAAAAAfs%2FtfJ_h7ni2t8%2Fs1600%2F8129-vision-of-st-francis-of-assisi-vicente-carducho.jpg&f=1&nofb=1)
INDEX
TABLE OF CONTENTS
THE LIFE OF SAINT FRANCIS OF ASSISI
ILLUSTRATIONS
THE LIFE OF SAINT FRANCIS OF ASSISI
PROLOGUE
1. The grace of God our Saviour hath in these latter days appeared in His servant Francis unto all such as be truly humble, and lovers of holy Poverty, who, adoring the overflowing mercy of God seen in him, are taught by his ensample to utterly deny ungodliness and worldly lusts and to live after the manner of Christ, thirsting with unwearied desire for the blessed hope. For God Most High regarded him, as one that truly was poor and of a contrite spirit, with so great condescension of His favour as that not only did He raise him up in his need from the dust of his worldly way of life, but also made him a true professor, leader, and herald of Gospel perfection. Thus He gave him for a light unto believers, that by bearing witness of the light he might prepare for the Lord the way of light and peace in the hearts of the faithful. For Francis, even as the morning star in the midst of a cloud, shining with the bright beams of his life and teaching, by his dazzling radiance led into the light them that sat in darkness and in the shadow of death, and, like unto the rainbow giving light in the bright clouds, set forth in himself the seal of the Lord’s covenant. He preached the gospel of peace and salvation unto men, himself an Angel of the true peace, ordained of God to follow in the likeness of the Forerunner, that, preparing in the desert the way of sublimest Poverty, he might preach repentance by his ensample and words alike. For, firstly, he was endowed with the gifts of heavenly grace; next, enriched by the merits of triumphant virtue; filled with the spirit of prophecy and appointed unto angelic ministries; thereafter, wholly set on fire by the kindling of the Seraph, and, like the prophet, borne aloft in a chariot of fire; wherefore it is reasonably proven, and clearly apparent from the witness of his whole life, that he came in the spirit and power of Elias.
In like wise, he is thought to be not unmeetly set forth in the true prophecy of that other friend of the Bridegroom, the Apostle and Evangelist John, under the similitude of the Angel ascending from the sunrising and bearing the seal of the Living God. For at the opening of the sixth seal, I saw, saith John in the Apocalypse, another Angel ascending from the sunrising and bearing the seal of the Living God.
2. Now that this Angel was indeed that messenger of God, beloved of Christ, our ensample and the world’s wonder, Francis, the servant of God, we may with full assurance conclude, when we consider the heights of lofty saintliness whereunto he attained, and whereby, living among men, he was an imitator of the purity of the Angels, and was also set as an ensample unto them that do perfectly follow after Christ. That this belief should be faithfully and devoutly held we are convinced by the vocation that he shewed to call to weeping and to mourning, and to baldness, and to girding with sackcloth, and to set a mark upon the foreheads of the men that sigh and that cry, by the sign of his penitent’s Cross and habit fashioned like unto a Cross. Moreover, it is further confirmed, with unanswerable witness unto its truth, by the seal of the likeness of the Living God, to wit, of Christ Crucified, the which was imprinted on his body, not by the power of nature or the skill of art, but rather by the marvellous might of the Spirit of the Living God.
3. Feeling myself unworthy and insufficient to relate the life most worthy of all imitation of this most venerable man, I should have in no wise attempted it, had not the glowing love of the Brethren moved me thereunto, and the unanimous importunity of the Chapter General incited me, and that devotion compelled me, which I am bound to feel for our holy Father. For I, who remember as though it happened but yesterday how I was snatched from the jaws of death, while yet a child, by his invocation and merits, should fear to be convicted of the sin of ingratitude did I refrain from publishing his praises. And this was with me the chief motive for undertaking this task, to wit, that I, who own my life of body and mind to have been preserved unto me by God through his means, and have proved his power in mine own person, and knew the virtues of his life, might collect as best I could, albeit I could not fully, his deeds and words,—fragments, as it were, overlooked in part, in part scattered,—that they might not be utterly lost on the death of those that lived with the servant of God.
4. Accordingly, that the true story of his life might be handed down unto posterity by me the more assuredly and clearly, I betook me unto the place of his birth, and there did hold diligent converse with his familiar friends that were yet living, touching the manner of life of the holy man and his passing away; and with those in especial that were well acquainted with his holiness, and were his chief followers, who may be implicitly believed by reason of their well-known truthfulness and approved uprightness. But in relating the things that through His servant God vouchsafed to work, I deemed it best to shun all fantastic ornaments of style, forasmuch as that the devotion of the reader increaseth more by a simple than by an ornate speech. Nor have I always woven together the history according unto chronology, that I might avoid confusion, but I rather endeavoured to preserve a more coherent order, setting down sometimes facts of divers kinds that belong unto the same period, sometimes facts of the same kind that belong unto divers periods, as they seemed best to fit in together.
5. Now the beginning of the life of Francis, its course, and its consummation, are divided into fifteen chapters, as set down below, and thuswise described.
The first treateth of his manner of life in the secular state.
The second, of his perfect conversion unto God, and of the repairing of the three churches.
The third, of the founding of his Religion, and sanction of the Rule.
The fourth, of the advancement of the Order under his hand, and of the confirmation of the Rule already sanctioned.
The fifth of the austerity of his life, and of how all created things afforded him comfort.
The sixth of his humility and obedience, and of the divine condescensions shewn unto him at will.
The seventh, of his love for Poverty, and of the wondrous supplying of his needs.
The eighth, of the kindly impulses of his piety, and of how the creatures lacking understanding seemed to be made subject unto him.
The ninth, of his ardent love, and yearning for martyrdom.
The tenth, of his zeal and efficacy in prayer.
The eleventh, of his understanding of the Scriptures, and of his spirit of prophecy.
The twelfth, of the efficacy of his preaching, and of his gift of healing.
The thirteenth, of the sacred stigmata.
The fourteenth, of his sufferings and death.
The fifteenth, of his canonisation, and the translation of his body.
Thereafter is added some account of the miracles shewn after his blessed departure.
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