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| October 4th - St. Francis of Assisi |
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Posted by: Stone - 10-04-2021, 06:35 AM - Forum: October
- Replies (2)
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October 4 – St Francis, Confessor
And I saw another Angel ascending from the rising of the sun, having the sign of the living God; and he cried with a loud voice to the four Angels to whom it was given to hurt the earth and the sea, saying: Hurt not the earth, nor the sea, nor the trees, till we sign the servants of our God in their foreheads.
The sixth seal of the Book of destinies had just been opened before the eyes of the prophet of Patmos. It was a time of anguish, the hour for the wicked to cry to the mountains: Fall upon us. The sun was darkened: an image of the Sun of Justice eclipsed by the night of iniquity; the moon, the figure of the Church, appeared red as blood, through the evils that defiled the sanctuary; the stars fell from heaven, as the fig-tree casteth its green figs when it is shaken by a great wind. Who would appease the Lamb, and retard the day of wrath? At the invitation of the Saints and of the Apostolic See, let us recognize the Angel who won for the world a delay of the judgment; the Angel with the impress of God upon a mortal body; the Seraph with his sacred stigmata, the sight of which once more disarmed the justice of God. Dante thus sings of the elect of God, under whose leadership took place on earth as it were a repetition of the first and only Redemption:
“Between Tupino, and the wave that falls
From blest Ubaldo’s chosen hill, there hangs
Rich slope of mountain high, whence heat and cold
Are wafted thro’ Perugia’s eastern gate:
And Nocera with Gualdo, in its rear,
Mourn for their heavy yoke. Upon that side,
Where it doth break its steepness most, arose
A sun upon the world, as duly this
From Ganges doth: therefore let none who speak
Of that place say Ascesi; for its name
Were lamely so delivered; but the East,
To call things rightly, be it henceforth styled.
He was not yet much distant from his rising,
When his good influence ‘gan to bless the earth.
A dame to hwom none openeth pleasure’s gate
More than to death, was, ‘gainst his father’s will,
His stripling choice: and he did make her his,
Before the spiritual court, by nuptial bonds
And in his father’s sight: from day to day
Then loved her more devoutly. She bereaved
Of her first husband, slighted and obscure,
Thousand and hundred years and more, remain’d
Without a single suitor, till he came.
…
“The lovers’ titles—Poverty and Francis.
Their concord and glad looks, wonder and love,
And sweet regard gave birth to holy thoughts,
So much, that venerable Bernard* first
Did bare his feet, and, in pursuit of peace
So heavenly, ran, yet deem’d his footing slow.
O hidden riches! O prolific good!
Egidius bares him next, and next Sylvester,
And follow, both, the Bridegroom: so the Bride
Can please them. Thenceforth goes he on his way
The father and the master, with his spouse,
And with that family, whom now the cord
Girt humbly: nor did abjectness of heart
Weigh down his eyelids, for that he was son
Of Pietro Bernadone, and by men
In wondrous sort despised. But royally
His hard intention he to Innocent**
Set forth; and from him first received the seal
Of his religion.
“And when
He had, thro’ thirst of martyrdom, stood up
In the proud Soldan’s presence, and there preached
Christ and his folowers, but found the race
Unripen’d for conversion; back once more
He hasted, (not to intermit his toil,)
And reap’d Ausonian lands. On the hard rock,
Twixt Arno and the Tiber, he from Christ
Took the last signet, which his limbs two years
Did carry. Then, the season come that he,
Who to such good had destined him, was pleased
To advance him to the meed, which he had earned
By his self-humbling; to his brotherhood,
As their just heritage, he gave in charge
His dearest lady: and enjoined their love
And faith to her; and, from her bosom, will’d
His goodly spirit should move forth, returning
To its appointed kingdom; nor would have
His body laid upon another bier.”***
*Bernard of Quintaval, the saint’s first disciple.
**Innocent III
***Dante, Paradiso, canto XI
Francis took his flight, for his work was done; innumerable souls were now treading the paths of penance; the Cross of Christ was set before the eyes of the whole world as the treasure of the Church, now that she was beginning her ascent of Calvary. How admirably had the sanctifying Spirit conducted this work!
At the age of four and twenty, Francis, who was destined not to see his forty-sixth year, was the head of a party of gay youths who filled Assisi day and night with their songs. Full of the poetry of France (from which country he borrowed his name), he dreamed of nothing but worldly renown and knightly prowess. One night he beheld in a prophetic dream a large assortment of arms and weapons. “For whom are all these?” he inquired; and on hearing the answer: “For thee and thy soldiers,” he hastened to join Gauthier de Brienne, who was at war with the Germans in the South of Italy. But God arrested him: in a series of manifestations, to which the young man corresponded with all the generous ardor of his pure heart, our Lord revealed to him the object of his life’s labor, the standard he was to carry through the world, and the Lady in whose service he was to win his spurs.
The Church, ever under attack, yet hitherto ever victorious, seemed about to succumb, so undermined were her walls by heresy, so broken by the battering ram of the secular power; while within the citadel, the ancient faith was sinking under prolonged scandals, leaving the field open to the enterprises of traitors, and multiplying defections in a society already beginning to feel the torpor of death. Nevertheless, it is written that the gates of hell shall not prevail against the Church. “Francis, seest thou not that my house is falling to decay? Go, then, and repair it for me.”
There was need of a sudden surprise to disconcert the enemy; and of an energetic appeal, to rouse the sleepy garrison, and rally them around the too forgotten ensign of Christians, the Cross of Christ. Francis was to be, in his very flesh, the standard of the Crucified. The sacred wounds already pierced his soul, and made his eyes two ceaseless fountains of tears: “I weep for the Passion of Jesus Christ my Master; nor shall I blush to go weeping all over the world.”
Avarice was the crying sin of the age; the hearts of men, too preoccupied with earthly affairs to have a desire of heaven, must be delivered from a slavery which crushed out all noble thoughts, all love, all devotedness. Holy Poverty, the mother of that true liberty which disarms hell and laughs at tyrants, could alone achieve such a deliverance. Francis was taken with the beauty of poverty, in spite of the jeers and insults of the vulgar, and of his rejection by his own family; but his sublime folly was the salvation of his people, and he was blessed by our heavenly Father, as a true brother of his eternal Son.
As by nature the consubstantial Word receives his unbeginning Being from him who begets him eternally; so within the Holy Trinity, he has nothing appropriated to himself but the title of Son, to the glory of the Father, in the Holy Spirit who is their love. Such is God’s destitution of all things, whereof nothing created could give an idea, but which is reflected in the Incarnate Word’s sublime disappropriation in presence of that Father form whom he derived his all. Would it, then, be far wrong to consider the Poverty chosen by St. Francis as no other than Eternal Wisdom, offering herself, even under the old Law, to the human race, as bride, and as sister? Once espoused in Mary’s womb at the Incarnation, how great has been her fidelity! But whoever loves her must become in Jesus like unto her.
Quote:“Lord Jesus,” said Francis, “show me the paths of thy well-beloved Poverty. ‘Tis she that accompanied thee from thy Mother’s womb to the crib in the stable, and, on the waysides of the world, took care thou shouldst not have where to lay thy head. In the combat which concluded the war of our Redemption, Poverty, adorned with all the privations which form her bridal attire, mounted with thee upon the Cross, which even Mary could not ascend. She followed thee to thy borrowed tomb; and, as thou didst yield up thy soul in her embrace, so in her arms thou didst take it again in the glorious nakedness of the Resurrection; and together with her didst enter heaven, leaving to the earth all that was earthly. Oh! who would not love this queen of the world which she tramples under her feet, my lady and my love? Most poor Jesus, my sweet Master, have pity on me; without her I can taste no peace, and I die of desire.” (Franc. Opusc. t. i. Oratio B. Patris pro obtinen da paupertate)
God cannot turn a deaf ear to such entreaties. If he contends, it is in order to add fresh wounds of love, until the old man being destroyed, the new rises form the ruins, in all things conformed to the image of the heavenly Adam. Eighteen years later, after the prodigy on Mount Alvernia, Francis, impressed with the divine seal of Christ’s wounds, sang in heavenly language (In foco l’amor mi mise) the sublime combat which had made up his life:
Quote:“Love has cast me into a furnace, love has cast me into a furnace, I am cast into a furnace of love.
“My new Bridegroom, the loving Lamb, gave me the nuptial ring; then having cast me into prison, he cleft my heart, and my body fell to the ground.
“Those arrows, propelled by love, struck me and set me on fire. From peace he made war, and I am dying of sweetness.
“The darts rained so thick and fast, that I was all in an agony. Then I took a buckler, but the shafts were so swift that it shielded me no more; they mangled my whole body, so strong was the arm that shot them.
“He shot them so powerfully, that I despaired of parrying them; and to escape death, I cried with all my might: ‘Thou transgressest the laws of the camp.’ But he only set up a new instrument of war, which overwhelmed me with fresh blows.
“So true was his aim, that he never missed. I was lying on the ground, unable to move my limbs. My whole body was broken, and I had no more sense than a man deceased;
“Deceased, not by a true death, but through excess of joy. Then regaining possession of my body, I felt so strong, that I could follow the guides who led me to the court of heaven.
“Returning to myself, I took up arms, and I made war upon Christ; I rode into his territory, and meeting him, I engaged him at once, and took my revenge on him.
“Having had my revenge, I made a treaty with him; for from the beginning Christ had loved me with a true love. And now my heart has become capable of the consolations of Christ.”
Around the standard-bearer of Christ were already gathered those whom he called his knights of the Round Table. However captivating he may have been when his fellow-citizens proclaimed him the flower of their youth, and he presided at their feasts and games; Francis was much more attractive now in his life of self-renunciation. Scarcely ten years after his espousals with holy Poverty, he had so well avenged her for having been so long despised, that she held full court in the midst of five thousand Friars Minor encamped under the walls of Assisi; while Clare and her companions formed for her such a suite of honor as no empress could ever boast of. The enthusiasm soon became so general that Francis, in order to satisfy it without depopulating the State and the Church, gave to the world his Third Order, into which, led by Louis IX of France and Elizabeth of Hungary, entered countless multitudes of every nation and tribe and tongue. Thanks to the three Seraphic Orders, as well as to the triple militia founded at the same time by Dominic de Gusman, devotedness to the Roman Church, and the spirit of penance and prayer, everywhere triumphed for a time over the anticipated rationalism, the luxury, and all the other evils which had been threatening the speedy ruin of the world.
The influence of the Saints springs from their sanctity, as rays from the focus. No rich man ever possessed the earth to such a degree as this poor man who, seeking God and depending absolutely upon his Providence, had regained the condition of Adam in Eden. Thus, as he passed along, the flocks would welcome him; the fishes would follow his boat in the water; the birds would gather round him and joyfully obey him. And why? Francis drew all things to himself because all things drew him to God.
With him there was no such thing as analyzing love, and making distinctions among those things which come from God and lead to God. To raise himself up to God, to compassionate with Christ, to be of service to his neighbor, to be in harmony with the whole universe like Adam when innocent, was for the seraphic father, says St. Bonaventure, one and the same impulse of that true piety which ruled his whole being. The divine fire within him found fuel in everything. No touch of the Holy Spirit, whencesoever it came, did Francis let pass; so much he feared to frustrate the effect of a single grace. He did not despise the stream for not being the ocean; and it was with an unheard of tenderness of devotion, says his son and historian Bonaventure, that Francis relished God’s goodness in creation, contemplated his supreme beauty in every created beauty, and heard the echo of heaven’s harmonies in the concert of beings sprung like man himself from the only source of existence. Hence it was by the sweet name of brothers and sisters that he invited all creatures to praise with him that well-beloved Lord, whose every trace on earth was the dear object of his love and contemplation.
Neither the progress nor the consummation of his holiness alteres, in this respect, what would now be called his method of prayer. On hearing that his death was approaching, and again a few minutes before he passed away, he sang, and would have others sing to him, his favorite canticle: “Praised be God my Lord, for all creatures, and especially for our brother the sun, which gives us light, and is an image of thee, my God! Praised be my Lord for our sister the moon; and for all the stars which he has created bright and beautiful in the heavens! Praised be my Lord for our brother the wind; and for the air, and the clouds, and the fine weather, and all the seasons; for our sister the water, which is very useful, humble, precious and pure; for our brother the fire, which is bright and strong; for our mother the earth, which bears us, and produces the fruits and the flowers! Be thou praised, O my God, for those who pardon and who suffer for love of thee! Be thou praised for our sister the death of the body, which no living man can escape; unhappy is he who dies in mortal sin; but happy is he whom death finds conformed to thy holy will! Praise and bless my Lord, give him thanks, and serve him in great humility.”
After having received the stigmata, Francis’ life was an unspeakable martyrdom; in spite of which he continued to travel through towns and villages, riding, like Jesus of whom he was so touching an image, upon a poor little ass; and everywhere he preached the Cross, working miracles and wonders of grace. Assisi cherishes the memory of the blessing bequeathed to it by its glorious son, when, gazing upon it for the last time from the beautiful plain that stretches at its feet, he exclaimed with tears: “Be thou blessed of the Lord, O city faithful to God, for in thee and by thee shall many souls be saved!”
The humble Portiuncula, the cradle of the Order, where Clare too had exchanged the vain ornaments of the world for the poverty of the Cross: St. Mary of the Angels, which awakens in the pilgrim a feeling of the nearness of heaven; and where the Great Pardon of the 2nd of August proves the pleasure our Lord still takes in it: this was the appointed place of Francis’ death. He passed away on the 3rd of October, towards eight o’clock in the evening; and although darkness had already set in, a flight of larks descended, singing and rising in heaven of the new sun, which was mounting towards the Seraphim.
Francis had chosen to be buried in the place of public execution, called the Colle d’Inferno, near the West wall of his native city. But within two years, Gregory IX enrolled him among the Saints, and changed the name of the hill into Colle del Paradiso. James the German built over the bare rock, where lies the Poor Man of Assisi, a two-storied church, which the genius of Giotto has made to outshine in glory all the princely palaces on earth.
The church’s narrative, though short, will complete these somewhat lengthy pages.
Quote:Francis was born at Assisi in Umbria, and, after his father’s example, followed from his youth a mercantile career. One day, contrary to his custom, he repulsed a poor man who begged an alms of him for Christ’s sake; but, immediately repenting of what he had done, he bestowed a large bounty upon the beggar, and at the same time made a promise to God, never to refuse an alms to any one that asked him. After this he fell into a serious illness; and on his recovery, devoted himself more eagerly than ever to works of charity, making such rapid progress in this virtue that, desirous of attaining evangelical perfection, he gave all he had to the poor. His father, angered at his proceedings, brought Francis before the Bishop of Assisi, that, in his presence, he might formally renounce all claim to his patrimony. The Saint gave up all to his father, even stripping off his garments, that he might, he said, for the future have more right to say: Our Father who art in heaven.
After hearing one day this passage of the Gospel: Do not possess gold nor silver, nor money in your purses; nor scrip for your journey, nor two coats, nor shoes, he took it for his rule of life, laid aside his shoes and kept but one tunic. He gathered together twelve disciples and founded the Order of the Minors. In the year of our salvation 1209 he went to Rome, to obtain the confirmation of his rule and Order from the Apostolic See. Pope Innocent III at first refused to see him; but having in sleep beheld the man he had repulsed supporting with his shoulders the Lateran basilica which was threatening to fall, he had him sought out and brought to him; and receiving him kindly confirmed the whole system of his institute. Francis then sent his brethren into every part of the world to preach the Gospel. He himself, desirous of an opportunity of martyrdom sailed into Syria; but the Soldan treated him most kindly; so that, unable to gain his end, he returned into Italy.
He built many convents of his Order; and then retired into solitude on Mount Alvernia; where he fasted forty days in honor of the Archangel St. Michael. On the Feast of the Exaltation of the holy Cross, he had a vision of a seraph bearing between his wings the figure of the Crucified, who impressed the sacred stigmata on his hands and feet and side. St. Bonaventure says he heard Pope Alexander IV, while preaching, relate how he had himself seen these wounds. These signs of Christ’s exceeding love for his servant excited universal wonder and admiration. Two years later, Francis grew very ill, and was carried, at his own request, into the church of St. Mary of the Angels; that he might give up his mortal life to God, in the very place where he had commenced his life of grace. There, after exhorting the brethren to poverty and patience, and the preservation of the faith of the holy, Roman Church, he said the Psalm: I cried to the Lord with my voice. When he reached the verse: The just wait for me, until thou reward me, he breathed forth his soul, on the fourth of the Nones of October. He was renowned for miracles; and Pope Gregory IX enrolled him among the Saints.
Mayst thou be blessed by every living soul, O thou whom our Savior associated so closely with himself in the work of Redemption. The world, created by God for himself, subsists through the Saints; for it is in them he finds his glory. At the time of thy birth, the Saints were few; the enemy of God and man was daily extending his darksome reign; and when society has entirely lost faith and charity, light and heat, the human race must perish. Thou didst come to bring warmth to the wintry world, till the thirteenth century became like a spring time, rich in beautiful flowers; but alas! no summer was to follow in its wake. By thee the Cross was forced upon men’s notice; not indeed, as heretofore, to be exalted in a permanent triumph, but to rally the elect in face of the enemy, who would too soon afterwards regain the advantage. The Church lays aside the robe of glory, which beseemed her in the days of our Lord’s undisputed royalty; together with thee, she treads barefoot the path of trials, which liken her to her divine Spouse suffering and dying for his Father’s honor. Do thou thyself, and by thy sons, ever hold aloft before her the sacred ensign.
It is by identifying ourselves with Christ on the Cross that we shall find him again in the splendors of his glory; for men, and God in man, cannot be separated; and both, thou didst say, must be contemplated by every soul. Yet no otherwise than by effective compassion with our suffering Head can we find the way of divine union and the sweet fruits of love. If the soul suffers herself to be led by the good pleasure of the Holy Ghost, this Master of masters will conduct her by no other way than that set forth by our Lord in the books of his humility, patience, and suffering.
O Francis, cause the lessons of thy amiable and heroic simplicity to fructify in us. May thy children, to the great profit of the Church, increase in number and still more in sanctity; and never spare themselves in teaching both by word and example, knowing, however, that the latter is of greater avail than the former. Raise them up again, with their former popularity in that country of France, which thou didst love on account of its generous aspirations, now stifled by the sordid vulgarity of money-makers. The whole Religious state looks upon thee as one of its most illustrious Fathers; come to its assistance in the trials of the present time. Friend of Dominic, and his companion under our Lady’s mantle, keep up between your two families the fraternal love which delights the Angels. May the Benedictine Order never lose the affection which causes it to rejoice always on this day; and by thy benefits to it, strengthen the bonds knit once for all by the gift of the Portiuncula!
![[Image: st-francis-of-assisi.jpg?w=688]](https://pseudoclasm.files.wordpress.com/2018/10/st-francis-of-assisi.jpg?w=688) |
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| Abp. Viganò defends traditional nuns against ‘bullying’ by Vatican |
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Posted by: Stone - 10-04-2021, 06:18 AM - Forum: Archbishop Viganò
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Abp. Viganò defends traditional nuns against ‘bullying’ by Vatican
'I assure the persecuted Religious Sisters of my constant prayer, inviting them to resist firmly and to offer their suffering for the conversion of their persecutors.
![[Image: IMG_1558-810x500.jpg]](https://www.lifesitenews.com/wp-content/uploads/2021/10/IMG_1558-810x500.jpg)
Fri Oct 1, 2021 -
(LifeSiteNews) — With profound sorrow and strong indignation, I follow the events related to the Apostolic Visitations that the Congregation for Institutes of Consecrated Life and Societies of Apostolic Life is carrying out in various Convents of contemplative women religious in the United States.
The manner in which these Apostolic Visitations are conducted, in violation of the canonical norms and the most elementary principles of the law; the intimidation and threats that characterize the interrogations to which the Nuns are subjected; and the psychological violence exercised over the members of these Convents, against the principles of charity and justice that ought to inspire the action of officials of a papal Dicastery — all of these reveal in all of its disturbing evidence the prejudice of the persecutory intentions of the Visitators, who are cynical executors of the orders already given by the Prefect Cardinal João Braz de Aviz and by the Secretary Archbishop José Rodriguez Carballo, following Bergoglio’s precise instructions. No matter which community is targeted, the mobbing or group bullying by the Visitators, with the purpose of dividing the sisters is always the same, as is the attempt to create strong psychological pressure, even to the point of violating their private conscience, and serious disturbance to individuals who are accustomed to living in silence, prayerful recollection, and penance.
Behind this purging operation, like everything that distinguishes the work of the Bergoglian church, there is a hatred and an iconoclastic fury towards the Communities of Contemplative Life, and in a particular way against those tied to Tradition and the Ancient Rite. This hatred has become commonplace with the infamous Instruction Cor Orans and its cruel and merciless application. What also stands out is an insane interest in the finances and donations that these communities receive, which the Vatican tries to grab for itself using any pretext it can.
This hatred has no juridical or disciplinary justification, since these Convents targeted by the Vatican limit themselves to living according to the charism of their Order, in fidelity to their Holy Founders and in a spirit of sincere communion with the Church. The number of their vocations is increasing, as is happening for all the Institutes in which the Rule of the Founders is put into practice and the Tridentine Liturgy is celebrated. The “fault” of these Religious Sisters is that they want to remain faithful to the immutable Magisterium of the Church and her two-thousand-year Tradition, to her venerable Liturgy. In the end, this is the only “fault” of all of the secular and religious communities, both of men and of women, in the face of the ruthless destructive action of Bergoglio.
I consider it my precise duty as a Pastor to denounce in no uncertain terms the systematic work of demolition being carried out by the Congregation for Institutes of Consecrated Life, whose leaders make no secret of their aversion to any form of consecrated life, in perfect harmony with the one who has given them their mandate, and accompanied by the most disconcerting, inert silence of the Ordinaries, who are incapable of defending and protecting the most precious and vulnerable part of the Mystical Body.
We cannot forget that the merciless persecution of the Vatican has already struck other flourishing communities of religious women, which are now totally destroyed: I am thinking of the Franciscan Sisters of the Immaculate (Italy), the Little Sisters of Mary of Saint-Aignan-sur-Roe (France), the Sisters of Auerbach (Germany), and the Dominican Sisters of the Holy Spirit (France) — to name only a few.
I also mention that the ones responsible for this action are the first ones against whom a disciplinary action should have been undertaken, following the very serious financial scandals that involved Carballo when he was Minister-General of the Franciscan Friars Minor. His position is so compromised that he had to reside inside the Vatican, even though the Secretaries of the Congregation usually reside outside the Leonine Walls. Cardinal Braz de Aviz, a notorious follower of liberation theology, was appointed by Bergoglio as head of the Congregation for Religious precisely in order to “re-educate” the members of institutes of consecrated life, following the Stalinist methods that distinguish the government of the Bergoglian deep church. It is a purge worthy of the worst dictatorial regimes, in line with the climate of terror that has reigned in the Vatican since 2013.
I urge my brother Bishops, priests, and above all the faithful laity to raise their voices against the destruction of Convents of contemplative life and traditional religious Communities. It is necessary to give not only spiritual and moral support, but also material and media support to the victims of an attack that has been getting worse in recent weeks after the promulgation of the Motu Proprio Traditionis Custodes, so that the persecuted religious sisters may be defended and those who are responsible for this persecution that is hateful in the eyes of God and the entire ecclesial community may be exposed.
I understand well how difficult it is, in the face of the perversion of ecclesiastical authority, to combine one’s solemn Vow of Obedience to one’s Superiors with the evidence of the evil purposes they pursue, and how painful it is to have to resist those who should be exercising authority in the name of Our Lord. Nonetheless, any collaboration with them would constitute a form of complicity and culpable connivance. Obedience to God and fidelity to the Church cannot be linked to blind servility towards those who show themselves to be enemies of both: “We must obey God rather than men,” according to the words of Saint Peter (Acts 5:29). And this applies to Religious as well as to secular clergy, whose silence in the face of the dissolution of the ecclesial body cannot last any longer.
In consideration of this grave dilemma of conscience that troubles the Religious Sisters, I address a particular appeal to the faithful laity and to the benefactors of Convents, so that they actively work, also through adequate legal means, to assure and protect the independence of these Convents and their property.
I assure the persecuted Religious Sisters of my constant prayer, inviting them to resist firmly and to offer their suffering for the conversion of their persecutors. May these silent Brides of Christ unite themselves spiritually to the painful Calvary of the Carmelite martyrs of Compiègne, the sixteen nuns who were guillotined during the Terror because they did not want to abandon their Carmel or renounce their religious vows. May the heroic resistance of these consecrated women, persecuted in odium fidei by bloodthirsty revolutionaries, be an example to them in these times of apostasy, in which anti-Catholic persecution and ideological fury are put in motion by those who ought to be protecting the communities of Contemplative Life as the most precious treasure of the Church and the most effective barrier against the assaults of the enemy. If the constant prayer of these blessed souls fails, the ecclesial body will be even more disarmed at the very moment in which this epochal battle rages most fiercely.
Like the prudent virgins of the Gospel parable (Mt 25:1-13), may Religious Women remain faithful to their Divine Spouse and await Him with lighted lamps. These dark times will pass, and along with them the renegades who rage against them.
The highest levels of the Vatican, and in particular Jorge Mario Bergoglio, will have to answer to God for these very grave sins of the Congregation for Institutes of Consecrated Life and Societies of Apostolic Life, which are not devoid of disturbing ideological connotations, as well as for the abuse of their authority against the good of the Church and the salvation of souls. May the Lord open the eyes of many who still do not want to recognize the apostasy that afflicts the Catholic Hierarchy.
+ Carlo Maria Viganò, Archbishop
Former Apostolic Nuncio to the United States
October 1, 2021
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| Prayer of St Therese to the Holy Face of Jesus |
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Posted by: Stone - 10-03-2021, 03:14 PM - Forum: In Honor of Our Lord
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Prayer of St Therese to the Holy Face of Jesus
![[Image: 1-.jpg?w=444&ssl=1]](https://i2.wp.com/sensusfidelium.us/wp-content/uploads/2019/10/1-.jpg?w=444&ssl=1)
“O Jesus, who, in Thy cruel Passion didst become the ‘reproach of men and the Man of Sorrows,’ I worship Thy divine Face. Once it shone with the beauty and sweetness of the Divinity; but now, for my sake, it is become as ‘the face of a leper.’
Yet, in that disfigured Countenance, I recognize Thy infinite love, and I am consumed with the desire of making Thee loved by all mankind.
The tears that flowed so abundantly from Thy Eyes are to me as precious pearls that I delight to gather, that with their worth I may ransom the souls of poor sinners.
O Jesus, whose Face is the sole beauty that ravishes my heart, I may not see here below the sweetness of Thy glance, nor feel the ineffable tenderness of Thy kiss, I bow to Thy Will—but I pray Thee to imprint in me Thy divine likeness, and I implore Thee so to inflame me with Thy love, that it may quickly consume me, and that I may soon reach the vision of Thy glorious Face in heaven.”
Amen.
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| October 3rd – St Therese of the Child Jesus, Virgin |
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Posted by: Stone - 10-03-2021, 03:07 PM - Forum: October
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October 3 – St Therese of the Child Jesus, Virgin
Wonder-worker as is the saint of today, fulfilling her dying prophecy, “After my death I will let fall a shower of roses,” she is her own greatest miracle. Her world-wide popularity, to which is united in most cases a devotion which has reorientated many a life, and in all has been a stimulus and an encouragement, is recognized to be phenomenal. It has been said with respect to doctrinal definitions that the faithful have a passive “infallibility,” whereby their need answers exactly to the definition; the same would seem to be true in the case of devotions and saints; they are given to us when and as they are needed.
In an age which worships visible efficiency which, even in the spiritual sphere, too often demands substantial material results before it will revere and believe, the saint who has won hearts—and souls—as few indeed have done, is no great religious and social reformer nor, in her lifetime, an apostle carrying the truth to the ends of the earth; nor even a preacher upon whose words crowds have hung spellbound, nor a scholar gathering around his rostrum all that was best in the intellectual world of his day; but a girl who was unknown beyond a small circle of relatives and friends. She had received no special educational advantages; she lived her life in a quiet little Norman town to which few travellers found their way. Still a child in years, but mature already in the things of God, she entered the Carmel in the same town, an obscure convent of recent foundation, barren of the historical associations which cluster around many French Carmels. For ten years she lived a life made up for the most part of religious exercises and simple domestic duties; a life, to the average man or woman of the world, colorless and monotonous, in which of necessity talents were wasted and all chance of doing good service to the world forever forfeited. At twenty-four she died of consumption, but over the simple grave accorded to such as she were placed the mysterious words: “I will spend my heaven doing good upon earth.”
Shortly before her death, she, Therese of the Child Jesus, always so humble and simple, had declared, among other startling prophetic sayings, that: All the world would love her. During the last two years of her life, in obedience to her Superiors, she had written in her scanty free time, on poor scraps of paper, an account of her life, and for this, likewise, she foretold a strange success. Today “The Story of a Soul” has been translated into every civilized tongue; the literature which has gathered round the book and its writer would form a library, and Lisieux is one of the great pilgrimage centers of the world.
In her book the young Carmelite explained the theory and practice of her own spiritual life: her “little Way;” the “Way of Spiritual Childhood;” and, when dying, she spoke with a strange solemnity and certainty of the mission awaiting her in the eternal future—to teach her “Way” to souls. Too often described as something new, it is, as tow Sovereign Pontiffs have pointed out, but a return to the way of the Gospels. Others have walked the same path to heaven before St. Therese of Lisieux, but to her it has been given to show it once more to a self-sufficient, sophisticated world, and that in such wise that, to men of good will, it may be a sure and safe highway wherein even the foolish cannot err.
The Way of Spiritual Childhood stresses again that “love,” and not great outward achievement, is the fulfilling of the law; that it is character, not career, which counts; that since for most souls sanctity, if achieved at all, must be achieved in a restricted sphere, the daily round of little duties, little sacrifices, common tasks and trials, all fulfilled and accepted perfectly and for love, generous doing and suffering of the will of God, will provide all that is needful for the highest heroism. Beneath her childlike phrasing the saint has portrayed a life which calls for an unflagging generosity and courage which, united with the humility and confidence of a little child, is heroic indeed. Benedict XV has called her way “the secret of sanctity.”
And because she lived “a little one” she was “pleasing to the Most High.” All the world had loved her; popular acclamation had soon declared her a saint, but the voice which alone can pronounce thereon was not long silent. Her cause was exempted form the years of delay normally required; Pope Benedict XV pronounced the Decree of Heroicity (.pdf; p. 453) of her virtues, and by Pius XI, now happily reigning, she was both beatified and canonized at an interval of but two years, the first beatification and the first canonization of his pontificate. Two years later the Pope declared her the special patroness of all Catholic Foreign Missions in the same rank as St. Francis Xavier.
The following lessons are assigned to the second Nocturn of her office. By special privilege of His Holiness Pius XI her feast is kept in her own convent on September 30, the anniversary of her death. In the Carmelite Order it is celebrated on October 1, and everywhere is transferred to October 3.
Quote:Theresa of the Child Jesus was born in Alençon in France. Her parents were estimable people, well known for their piety and their love of God. From her earliest childhood, endowed by a special grace of the Holy Ghost, she yearned to enter the religious life. She promised God with the utmost sincerity that she would deny him nothing he might ask of her. She kept this promise faithfully to the end of her life, although she had to suffer a great deal to keep it. Her mother died when Theresa was but five years old. From then on the child committed herself to the providence of God, under the vigilant care of a most tender father and her elder sisters. Under their teaching Theresa raced as gayly strong as a young giant along the way of perfection. At the age of nine she was sent to school at Lisieux to the Benedictine nuns, where she made remarkable progress in her knowledge of divine things. In her tenth year she was ill for a long time of a serious and mysterious malady. From this, as she herself relateth, she was delivered only by the power of God himself, through the intercession of the Blessed Virgin Mary, who appeared to her with a smiling countenance, and to whom under the title of our Lady of Victories, she was constantly making novenas. Filled with angelic fervor she prepared herself at this time with the utmost care to receive Christ in the sacred banquet of her first Holy Communion.
After being refreshed for the first time with the Eucharistic Bread Theresa seemed to develop an insatiable hunger for the celestial food. Then, as if by inspiration, she asked Jesus to turn all her earthly consolation into bitterness. After that she burned with a most tender love for Christ the Lord and for his Church. More than anything in the world she wanted to enter the Discalced Carmelites, where by self-sacrifice she might assist priests, missionaries and the whole Church, and so gain innumerable souls for Christ Jesus. All this, she promised God would do for her, even when apparently she lay at the point of death. Her extreme youth was an obstacle which hindered her entrance upon the religious life. Even this she overcame by her incredible courage of soul. She entered Carmel at Lisieux happily at the age of fifteen. There God fashioned the heart of Theresa in a marvellous way, teaching her to ascend to him step by step. Imitating the hidden life of the Virgin Mary like a well-watered garden she bore flowers of every virtue, especially an abiding love of God and neighbor.
That she might please the most high God to greater degree, when she read in Sacred Scriptures the warning, Whoever is a little one, let him come unto me, she determine to be a little one in spirit. As such she consecrated herself forever with childlike confidence to God, her most loving Father. The way of spiritual childhood, following the teachings of the Gospel, she taught to others, especially to the novices who, training in the pursuit of religious virtues, she undertook in obedience to her superiors. Overflowing with apostolic zeal she pointed out to a world filled with pride and a love of vanities, the simple way of the Gospels. Meanwhile Jesus, her spouse, inflamed her with a desire to suffer both in soul and in body. Moreover, perceiving that the love of God was everywhere rejected, she became filled with a grief and two years before her death, offered herself as a victim of love to the merciful God. She writeth that she was then wounded by a flame of fire from heaven, whereupon she became consumed by love, rapt as it were in ecstasy. Repeating over and over again the fervent words, My God, I love thee, she passed on to her Spouse on the 30th day of September in the year 1897, at the age of twenty-four years. As she was dying she promised that she would let fall upon earth a ceaseless shower of roses. This promise she hath indeed fulfilled in heaven, and her shower of roses hath continued to this very day. The Sovereign Pontiff Pius XI added her name to the Virgins declared Blessed and two years later, at the time of the great Jubilee, listed her among the Saints. He also appointed and declared her Patroness of all the missions.
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| Nineteenth Sunday after Pentecost |
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Posted by: Stone - 10-03-2021, 05:14 AM - Forum: Pentecost
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INSTRUCTION ON THE NINETEENTH SUNDAY AFTER PENTECOST
From Fr. Leonard Goffine's Explanations of the Epistles and Gospels for the Sundays, Holydays, and Festivals throughout the Ecclesiastical Year 36th edition, 1880
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THE Introit of the Mass is: I am the salvation of the people, saith the Lord: in whatever tribulation they shall cry to me, I will hear them: and I will be their Lord for ever. Attend, O my people, to my law: incline your ears to the words of my mouth. (Ps. lxxvii.) Glory, &c.
PRAYER OF THE CHURCH. Almighty and merciful God, graciously keep us from all things that are hurtful ; that we, being set free both in mind and body, may with ready minds accomplish whatever is Thine. Thro'.
EPISTLE. (Ephes. iv. 23—28.) Brethren, Be renewed in the spirit of your mind, and put on the new man, who according to God is created in justice and holiness of truth. Wherefore, putting away lying, speak ye the truth every man with his neighbor, for we are members one of another. Be angry, and sin not. Let not the sun go down upon your anger. Give not place to the devil. He that stole, let him now steal no more; but rather let him labor, working with his hands the thing which is good, that he may have something to give to him that suffereth need.
Quote:EXPLANATION. St. Paul admonishes the Ephesians to lay aside the old man, like a worn out garment, and put on the new man, that is, to renew their internal and external life. This renewal according to his teaching takes place, when we by a true repentance put away our vices, shun all lies, anger, injustice, &c, and adorn our soul with virtues, and zealously seek after Christian justice and perfection. We have, perhaps, already sought to change our manner of living, for which a jubilee or some other particular solemnity of the Church gave us occasion, and at that time, perhaps, purified our soul by a general confession, making the firm resolution to live for God, and work out our salvation, we appeared converted, and to have become other men: but how long did this conversion last? Ah, how soon did we fallback into the old, sinful ways. And why? Because we lived in too great, deceitful security. We thought everything accomplished by the general confession; we were satisfied, and omitted to employ the means of remaining in the state of grace. We did not thank God for the grace of conversion; we did not ask Him for the grace of perseverance; we frequented evil company, and did not avoid dangerous occasions; we indulged in idleness and pleasures as before. How can it appear strange, if such a conversion is fruitless? Ah, we should remain in wholesome fear even after the remission of our sins. (Ecclus. v. 5.) Even if we could say that we have done everything, nevertheless we cannot be certain, whether we be worthy of hatred or love. (Ecclus. ix. 1.) We should, therefore, work out our salvation according to the advice of St. Paul (Philipp. ii. 12.) in fear and trembling, and thus not fall into the old life of sin, losing the hope of a new conversion.
GOSPEL. (Matt. xxii. 1 — 14.) At that time, Jesus spoke to the chief priests and the Pharisees in parables, saying: The kingdom of heaven is likened to a king, who made a marriage for his son. And he sent his servants, to call them that were invited to the marriage, and they would not come. Again he sent other servants, saying: Tell them that were invited, Behold I have prepared my dinner; my beeves and fatlings are killed, and all things are ready: come ye to the marriage. But they neglected: and went their ways, one to his farm, and another to his merchandise: and the rest laid hands on his servants, and having treated them contumeliously, put them to death. But when the king had heard of it, he was angry: and sending his armies, he destroyed those murderers, and burnt their city. Then he saith to his servants: The marriage indeed is ready; but they that were invited were not worthy. Go ye therefore into the highways, and as many as you shall find, call to the marriage. And his servants going forth into the ways, gathered together all that they found, both bad and good; and the marriage was filled with guests. And the king went in to see the guests; and he saw there
a man who had not on a wedding garment: and he saith to him: Friend, how earnest thou in hither, not having on a wedding garment? But he was silent. Then the king said to the waiters: Bind his hands and feet, and cast him into the exterior darkness: there shall be weeping and gnashing of teeth. For many are called, but few are chosen.
Quote:REMARK. This parable, agrees in many respects with that for the second Sunday after Pentecost, and has the same meaning. See, therefore, the explanation of that gospel, as also of the feast of St. Catherine, to which may be added the following:
EXPLANATION. In this parable the king is our Heavenly Father who has espoused His only-begotten Son to the Church, and on this occasion prepares the most sumptuous marriage-feast by giving the evangelical doctrine, the holy Sacraments, and the heavenly joys. The servants sent to invite the guests are the prophets, apostles and disciples of Christ. Those invited are the Jews who despised the honor and grace of the divine King, destined for them, abused and killed His servants, and were, therefore, cast aside and with their city Jerusalem, destroyed by the armies of their enemies, as a just punishment; in their stead the heathens and all those nations were called, who were on the broad road to destruction, and who now occupy the places of the unfortunate Jews at the marriage-feast of the Church, and shall also occupy them in heaven. In the Jews to whom Christ addressed this parable, is verified that many of them, nay, all are called, but few chosen, because they would not heed the invitation.
APPLICATION. "We have the honor not only to be invited to this marriage-feast , but are in reality guests at it, because we are members of the Church of Christ by faith." But the Christian," says St. Gregory, "who is a member of the Church by faith, but has not charity, is like to a man who comes to the marriage-feast without the wedding garment." With this garment which is charity, Christ was vested, when He came to celebrate the nuptials with His spouse, the Church, and by the bond of charity the Son of God also unites Himself with His elect. He clearly lets us know that charity is the wedding garment which should vest us. Those, therefore, who believe and are in the communion of the Church, but who do not preserve the grace of charity, are indeed in the wedding-chamber, but they are not adorned with the wedding garment. They are dead members of the Church, and shall not be admitted without this garment into the celestial marriage-feast in the triumphant Church, but rather be cast like that unfortunate guest into exterior darkness. This guest was silent, when asked by the king, why he had not the wedding garment. By this we see, that no one can excuse himself to God for not having charity, because every one can have it, if he asks it from God, and, as St. Augustine says, our heart is the workshop of charity, and every one who has a heart can practice it.
PRAYER. I thank Thee, O Jesus, that Thou didst call me to the marriage-feast in Thy Church, give me the wedding garment of charity that I may be present at the celestial marriage-feast, and not be cast into exterior darkness.
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INSTRUCTION CONCERNING HELL
Cast him into the exterior darkness. (Matt. xxii. 13.)
What is hell?
HELL is that place where the damned must suffer eternal punishment.
Is there a hell?
Yes, reason, holy Scripture, and the Church teach us that there is a hell. Reason tells us that there is a just God who will punish sin. It is evident that all sins are not punished in this world; there must, therefore, be a place, where every mortal sin, not atoned for by sorrow and penance, will be punished, and this place is — hell. All nations from the beginning of the world, even those who had not the light of revelation, believed this.
But clearer still is the existence of hell shown by holy Scripture. The pious Job (x. 22.) speaks of a region of misery and darkness, where the shadows of death and no order, but where eternal terror dwells. The Prophet Isaias (xxx. S3-) says that hell is deep and wide, and that the fire burning in it, is like a stream of sulphur, ignited by the breath of the Lord. Our Saviour expressly says that those who have done evil, shall go to everlasting torment, (Matt. xxv. 46.) that they shall be tortured by everlasting fire. (Matt. xxv. 41.) He makes mention of hell, and says that an inextinguishable fire burns there, and a worm which never dies, plagues the wicked. (Mark ix. 42. 43; Matt. x. 28.) All the Fathers of the Church teach and testify to the same doctrine. St. Augustine, among many others, says: "The infinite wisdom of God tells us, that there is a hell, and the illimitable power of God it is that punishes the damned in a wonderful, but real manner."
Wherein do the pains of hell consist?
Sacred Scripture and the Church teach concerning the pains of the reprobate in hell, that the damned burn there in an inextinguishable fire. (Mark ix. 45.) The holy doctors of the Church say, that this fire is never extinguished, and its smoke ascends or rises from century to century. "I see this fire," says St. Gregory, "as if it were gifted with reason; it makes a distinction between the guilty, and tortures the damned according to the nature of their sins."
This fire burns, but never consumes its victims; it communicates, as Cassiodorus says, immortality to the reprobate and lets them suffer pain, which preserves them, like salt which penetrates the flesh and keeps it from corruption, as Jesus says: Every one shall be salted with fire. (Mark ix. 48.) This fire does not shine, it leaves the reprobate in darkness, (Matt. viii. 12.) and with this fire a never dying worm continually torments the damned. This worm is not only a bad conscience, say the holy Fathers, but particularly the privation of the Beatific Vision. Eternally will the thought torment the damned: I have lost God, the only true and highest Good, I have lost Him through my fault, I have lost Him for a brief pleasure , I have lost Him forever. In hell eternity devours all time; and if after millions and millions of years a damned soul wailingly asks his companion in misery: What time is it? he receives the answer: Eternity.
Who would not fear hell, and avoid sin which incurs eternal punishment, when he reflects upon this! And yet there are many, upon whom the truth of the existence of a hell makes no impression, who even deny that there is such a place, and who say: "God is love, He can have no pleasure in the torments of His creatures, He cannot eternally punish a sin which was committed in so short a time as is the life of man." But those who speak thus, forget that God is just, that His love and mercy are indeed always ready to forgive the contrite and penitent, but that His justice must also be satisfied, when the sinner continually rejects the merciful love of God; they forget, that every grievous sin which man commits voluntarily and knowingly is an infinite, eternal insult, offered to God, which can only be atoned for by an eternal punishment. For the perverted and malicious will of a man, who dies in mortal sin, remains perverted and malicious forever, therefore he must also be punished eternally.
O my dear Christian, do not listen to such deceivers; for just on account of their sinful life, they fear hell and therefore they endeavor to free themselves from this fear by denying the existence of hell; but they cannot succeed; for Jesus, the Truth, has told us, that there is a hell, and
His word remains for all eternity. Endeavor rather by a pious life to escape hell, descend there in spirit frequently according to the advice of a saint, contemplate the torments of the damned, and let this reflection urge you to imitate Christ, who has promised the joys of heaven to all His faithful followers.
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CONSOLING DOCTRINE ON THE JOYS OF HEAVEN
The kingdom of heaven is likened to a king, who made a marriage for his son. (Matt, xxii. 2.)
HEAVEN is compared by Christ to a marriage-feast, because we will there enjoy all imaginable pleasures in the most perfect union with God. In what these joys consist, St. Paul could not describe, although he was wrapt into the third heaven and tasted these pleasures; he only said: Eye hath not seen, nor ear heard, neither hath it entered into the heart of man, what things God hath prepared for them that love him. (i Cor. ii. 9.) Holy Writ, indeed, gives us many descriptions of the celestial joys, by comparing heaven to a paradise of bliss, sometimes to a precious pearl, or a treasure which neither rust nor moth consumes, nor thieves steal; again it represents heaven under the picture of a kingdom, a throne, a crown, whereby we are raised to the highest honor; at another time to the picture of a city which is built of gold, precious stones and pearls, lighted by the splendor of God, filled with magnificence and glory, and where the inhabitants enjoy undisturbed peace and security. These are only images or similitudes, which are taken from the most beautiful, most precious, and magnificent things of the earth, to teach us that heaven is as beautiful and pleasant a place, as we can wish and represent to ourselves, and that all possible beauty, agreeableness and joy may be found there in the highest and most perfect manner, free from evil, anxiety, disgust and fear of losing them. In heaven we will possess God Himself, the source of all joy and bliss, and will enjoy His own happiness for all eternity. More is not needed to give us the highest conception of heaven. Who would not willingly despise the vain, short and imperfect pleasures of this earth, whilst contemplating this indescribable bliss? Who would not willingly bear all the misfortunes and misery of this world, when considering that the more miserable we have been in this life the happier will we be hereafter. What would it avail us to have enjoyed all the pleasures of this world, if deprived of the pleasures of heaven in eternity!
ASPIRATION. How lovely are Thy tabernacles, Lord of hosts! my soul longeth and fainteth for the courts of the Lord. My heart and my flesh have
rejoiced in the living God. (Ps. lxxxiii. 2 — 3.) How do I loathe the world , when I contemplate heaven. (St. Ignatius Loyola.)
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| Sen. Ron Johnson: There is not an FDA approved COVID vaccine in the US |
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Posted by: Stone - 10-02-2021, 02:25 PM - Forum: COVID Vaccines
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Sen. Ron Johnson: There is not an FDA approved COVID vaccine in the US
Johnson explains the FDA approved the Comirnaty version that’s not available in the US
Fox News | October 1, 2021
Senator Ron Johnson, R-Wisc., claimed that the U.S. still doesn't have an FDA-approved vaccine as he exposed what was really approved by the government agency on "Fox News Primetime."
SEN. RON JOHNSON: Quote:We do not have an FDA-approved vaccine being administered in the U.S. The FDA played a bait and switch. They approved the Comirnaty version of Pfizer drugs. It’s not available in the U.S. They even admit it. I sent them a letter three days later going "What are you doing?" What they did is they extended the emergency use authorization for the Pfizer drug vaccine that’s available in the U.S., here that’s more than 30 days later, they haven’t asked that very simple question. If you’re saying that the Pfizer drug is the same as the Comirnaty, why didn’t you provide FDA approval on that? So, there’s not an FDA-approved drug and, of course, they announced it so they could push through these mandates so that people actually think, "Oh, OK now these things are FDA approved." They are not and again, maybe they should be, but the FDA isn’t telling me why.
Entire interview can be viewed at the link above.
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| October 2nd – The Holy Guardian Angels |
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Posted by: Stone - 10-02-2021, 02:15 PM - Forum: October
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October 2 – The Holy Guardian Angels
Although the solemnity of the 27th of September celebrates the praises of all the nine glorious choirs, yet the piety of the faithful, in the latter ages, desired to have a special day consecrated to the Guardian Angels. Several churches having taken the initiative, and kept the Feast under various rites and on different days, Paul V (1608) authorized its celebration ad libitum. Clement X (1670) established it by precept as a Feast of double rite on the 2nd of October, the first free day after Michaelmas, on which it thus remains in some way dependent.
It is of faith, on the testimony of the Scriptures and of unanimous tradition, that God commits to his Angels the guardianship of men, who are called to contemplate him together with these blessed spirits in their common fatherland. Catholic theology teaches that this protection is extended to every member of the human race, without any distinction of just and sinners, infidels and baptized. To ward off dangers; to uphold man in his struggle against the demons; to awaken in him holy thoughts; to prevent him from sinning, and even, at times, to chastise him; to pray for him, and present his prayers to God; such is the office of the Guardian Angel. So special is his mission that one Angel does not undertake the guardianship of several persons simultaneously; so diligent is his care that he follows his ward from the first day to the last of his mortal existence, receiving the soul as it quits this life, and bearing it from the feet of the sovereign Judge to the place it has merited in heaven, or to its temporary sojourn in the place of expiation and purification.
It is from the lowest of the nine choirs, the nearest to ourselves, that the Guardian Angels are for the most part selected. God reserves to the Seraphim, Cherubim and Thrones the honor of forming his own immediate court. The Dominations, from the steps of his throne, preside over the government of the universe; the Virtues watch over the course of nature’s laws, the preservation of species, and the movements of the heavens; the Powers hold the spirits of wickedness in subjection. The human race in its entirety, as also its great social bodies, the nations and the churches, are confided to the Principalities; while the Archangels, who preside over smaller communities, seem also to have the office of transmitting to the Angels the commands of God, together with the love and light which come down even to us from the first and highest hierarchy. O the depths of the wisdom of God! Thus, then, the admirable distribution of offices among the choirs of heavenly spirits terminates in the function committed to the lowest rank, the guardianship of man, for whom the universe subsists. Such is the teaching of the School; and the Apostle, in like manner, says: Are they not all ministering spirits, sent to minister for them who shall receive the inheritance of salvation?
But God, magnificent as he is towards the whole human race, honors in a special manner the princes of his people, those who are most favored by his grace, or who rule the earth in his name; the Saints testify that a supereminent perfection, or a higher mission in Church or State, ensures to the individual the assistance of a superior spirit, without the Angels, that was first deputed, being necessarily removed from his charge. Moreover, with regard to the work of salvation, the Guardian Angel has no fear of being left alone at his post; at his request, and at God’s command, the troops of his blessed companions who fill heaven and earth are ever ready to lend him their aid. These noble spirits, acting under the eye of God, whose love they desire to second by all possible means, have secret alliances between them, which sometimes induce between their clients even on earth, unions the mystery whereof will be revealed in the light of eternity.
“How profound a mystery,” says Origen, “is the apportioning of souls to the Angels destined for their guardians! It is a divine secret, part of the universal economy centered in the Man-God. Nor is it without ineffable order that the ministries of earth, the many departments of nature, are allotted to the heavenly Virtues; fountains and rivers, winds and forests, plants, living creatures of land and sea, whose various functions harmonize together, by the Angels directing them all to a common end.”
Again, on these words of Jeremias: How long shall the land mourn? Origen, supported by the authority of his translator St. Jerome, continues. “It is through each one of us that the earth rejoices or mourns; and not only the earth, but water, fire, air, all the elements; by which name we must here understand not insensible matter, but the Angels who are set over all things on earth. There is an Angel of the land who, with his companions, mourns over our crimes. There is an Angel of the waters to whom are applied the words of the Psalm: The waters saw thee, and they were afraid, and the depths were troubled; great was the noise of the waters; the clouds sent out a sound, for thy arrows pass.”
How grand is nature, viewed in this light! It is thus the ancients, more truthful as well as more poetical than our generation, always considered the universe. Their error lay in adoring these mysterious powers, to the detriment of the only God, under whom they stoop that bear up the world.
“Air and earth and ocean, everything is full of Angels,” says St. Ambrose. “Eliseus, besieged by a whole army, felt no fear; for he beheld invisible cohorts assisting him. May the prophet open thine eyes also, may the enemy, be he legion, not terrify thee; thou thinkest thyself hemmed in, and thou art free: there are more with us than with them.”
But let us return to our own specially-deputed Angel, and meditate on this other testimony: “The noble guardian of each one of us sleeps not, nor can he be deceived. Close thy door, and make the darkness of night; but remember, thou art never alone; he has no need of daylight in order to see thy actions.” And who is it that speaks thus? Not a Father of the Church, but a pagan, the slave-philosopher Epictetus.
In conclusion, let us listen to the Abbot of Clairvaux, who here gives free reign to his eloquence: “In every place show respect to thy Angel. Let gratitude for his benefits incite thee to honor his greatness. Love this thy future coheir, the guardian appointed for thee by the Father during thy childhood. For though we are sons of God, we are as yet but children, and long and dangerous is our journey. But God hath given his Angels charge over thee, to keep thee in all thy ways. In their hands they shall bear thee up, lest thou dash thy foot against a stone. Thou shalt walk upon the asp and the basilisk; and thou shalt trample under foot the lion and the dragon. Yes; where the road is smooth enough for a child, they will content themselves with guiding thee, and sustaining thy footsteps, as one does for children. But if trials threaten to surpass thy strength, they will bear thee up in their hands. Oh! those hands of Angels! Thanks to them, what fearful straits we have passed through, as it were without thinking, and with no other impression left upon us than that of a nightmare suddenly dispelled!”
And in his commentary on the Canticle of Canticles, St. Bernard thus describes the triumph of the Angel: “One of the companions of the Spouse, sent from heaven to the chosen soul as mediator; on witnessing the mystery accomplished, how he exults, and says: I give thee thanks, O God of majesty, for having granted the desire of her heart! Now it was he that, as a persevering friend, had not ceased, on the way, to murmur into the soul’s ear: Delight in the Lord, and he will give thee the requests of thy heart; and again: Expect the Lord, and keep his way; and then: If he make any delay, wait for him, for he will surely come and will not tarry. Meanwhile he represented to our Lord the soul’s desire, saying: As the hart panteth after the fountains of water, so this soul panteth after thee, O God; have pity on her, hear her cries, and visit her in her desolation. And now the faithful paranymph, the confidant of ineffable secrets, is not jealous. He goes from the Spouse to the bride, offering desires, bringing back gifts; he incites the one, he appeases the other. Sometimes, even in this world, he brings them into each other’s presence, either by raising up the Bride in ecstasy, or by bringing down the Bridegroom; for he is one of the household, and well known in the palace; and he fears no rebuff, for every day he beholds the face of the Father.”
Blessed be ye, O holy Angels, for that your charity is not wearied out by the crimes of men; among so many other benefits, we thank you for keeping the earth habitable, by deigning to dwell always therein. Solitude often weighs heavily upon the hearts of God’s children; in the great towns, and in the paths of the world, where one meets only strangers or enemies; but if the number of the just grows less, yours never diminishes. In the midst of the excited multitude, as well as in the desert, not a human being that has not beside him an Angel, the representative of universal Providence over wicked and good alike. O blessed spirits! you and we have the same fatherland, the same thought, the same love; why should the confused noises of a frivolous crowd disturb the heavenly life we may lead even now with you? Does the tumult of public places hinder you from holding your choirs there, or prevent the Most High from hearing your harmonies? We also, beholding by faith the face of our heavenly Father, which you ever delightedly contemplate, we wish to sing in every place the praises of our Lord and to unite at all times our adorations with yours. Thus, when our manners have become altogether angelic, the present life will be full of peace, and we shall be well prepared for eternity.
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| California Becomes First State To Require Students Be Vaccinated To Attend School |
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Posted by: Stone - 10-01-2021, 02:58 PM - Forum: COVID Vaccines
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California Becomes First State To Require Students Be Vaccinated To Attend School
ZH | OCT 01, 2021
Fresh of his victory in the gubernatorial runoff, California Gov. Gavin Newsom just announced that California's schools will soon require all eligible public and private school students in 7th grade and higher in the Golden State to be vaccinated against COVID, a first-in-the-nation policy that Newsom says will impact millions of students by fall 2022, or possibly sooner.
The mandate would impact students in grades 7 through 12 and will be imposed during the next semester after (and assuming) the FDA gives full approval for vaccines for children ages 12 and older.
"This is just another vaccine," Newsom said during a news conference after he announced the "state-wide" mandate, claiming the COVID jab would join "a well-established list that currently includes 10 vaccines and well-established rules and regulations that have been advanced by the Legislature for decades."
Readers can watch the clip below:
Once the vaccines are approved for use in younger students, they will likely be phased in. Apparently, it doesn't matter whether COVID is still a problem by then or not.
The mandate could take effect for students 12 and older as early as January 2022, if full federal approval comes along by then, the governor said during live remarks at a San Francisco school.
Presently, the vaccine is only approved for patients aged 16 or older, though Pfizer has published trial results and submitted them to the FDA, suggesting approval for students aged 12 o 15 could likely come before the end of the year. If this happens, all students in 7th grade and above will be required to get the vaccine, or attend online school - or home school - permanently.
Medical and religious exemptions will be offered, Newsom said.
What's more, vaccines for students aged 5 to 11 are not that far off, which means the state could soon extend its requirements to all children in Kindergarten or older. Pfizer is expected to apply for authorization imminently with evidence that shows its vaccine is safe for children in that age range.
California was famously the first state to lock down, minting the "two weeks to stop the spread" slogan that's remembered
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| Louisiana Health System Now Requires Spouses of Employees to Get Vaccinated, or Pay |
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Posted by: Stone - 10-01-2021, 08:56 AM - Forum: Pandemic 2020 [Secular]
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Forced Vaccinations Get Worse – Louisiana Health System Now Requires Spouses of Employees to Get Vaccinated,
or Pay a Non-Compliance Penalty for Vaxx Violations Every Pay Period
September 30, 2021 | Sundance
This is just getting beyond ridiculous now. Ochsner Health [Website Here] is a healthcare provider/system that delivers healthcare services to the people of Louisiana, Mississippi and the Gulf South. Ochsner Health is now requiring the spouses or domestic partners of all employees be vaccinated, or the employee will pay a $100 per pay period penalty. (Source Link)
Hopefully some employee of Ochsner Health will file a lawsuit fast. The basis for the lawsuit could likely be framed around punitive employee punishment based on “marital status”, a clear violation of existing civil rights law. Why stop at spouses? Why not kids or other dependents? What about all other vaccines before COVID? Why now?
By current federal and most state statutes, no employer is legally permitted to discriminate against any employee based on marital status. A penalty against a spouse for non compliance with an employer vaccine mandate is a punitive action only against married persons. Find a court that will look at this as a violation of the discrimination clause, because it only targets married employees. Let’s see what happens.
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| Merck Releasing "Phenomenal" Test Results For Experimental COVID Pill |
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Posted by: Stone - 10-01-2021, 08:28 AM - Forum: Pandemic 2020 [Secular]
- Replies (1)
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"This Is A Game-Changer" - Merck Releasing "Phenomenal" Test Results For Experimental COVID Pill
![[Image: Merck.jpg?itok=VMr6MgbQ]](https://assets.zerohedge.com/s3fs-public/styles/inline_image_mobile/public/inline-images/Merck.jpg?itok=VMr6MgbQ)
ZH | OCT 01, 2021 - 07:45 AM
Looks like Merck just beat Pfizer to the punch.
Merck announced Friday that an experimental COVID pill it has developed reduced hospitalizations and deaths by 50% in people recently infected with COVID.
The company will soon ask health officials in the US and abroad to authorize use of the drug.
The news came as a welcome surprise to the public, although COVID cases are already waning in the US and in hard-hit economies in Asia, the drug could create "a real therapeutic advance" that could dramatically decrease the risk of death from COVID.
If approved (and odds are it will be) the drug would be the first treatment for COVID. Some compared it to tamiflu, in that patients should take it within 5 days of COVID infection (like those infected with the flu are instructed to take tamiflu early).
Former FDA Director Dr. Scott Gottlieb told CNBC that the trial results are clearly "profoundly" positive, even though researchers decided to stop the trial early because the drug showed significant success, meaning it would be unethical to keep giving patients placebos. To test the drug, they needed to test more than 700 unvaccinated people in a global study. The people were all considered in the "high risk" category due to factors like age, and other characteristics from their "health profile".
Per the results, 7% of volunteers in the group that received the drug were hospitalized, and none of them died, compared with a 14% rate of hospitalization and death (include eight who died) in the placebo group.
According to Dr. Gottlieb, "this is a phenomenal result. This is a profound game-changer that we have an oral pill that had this kind of effect on patients who are already symptomatic."
Dr. Gottlieb also pointed out that the team that developed the drug "also invented the first successful antibody against ebola so this is a very good drug-development team."
"And remember we have two other drugs in development one by Pfizer (where Dr. Gottlieb serves on the board) and the other by Roches," he said.
Patients won't be taking the drug for very long, typically around five days, which means "the safety profile is probably pretty good," Dr. Gottlieb said.
Per the NYT, "the Merck pill’s efficacy was lower than that of monoclonal antibody treatments, which mimic antibodies that the immune system generates naturally when fighting the virus. Those drugs have been in high demand recently, but they are expensive, are typically given intravenously, and have proved cumbersome and labor-intensive for hospitals and clinics to administer. Studies have shown that they reduce hospitalizations and deaths 70 to 85 percent in similar high-risk Covid patients."
The Merck drug is significantly chemically different from the Pfizer drug that's in its final round of studies, which means there's the possibility of creating a cocktail of anti-viral treatments for COVID. Merck has said it can produce 10MM pills by the end of this year, and Dr. Gottlieb said he expects they'll ramp up production quickly by partnering with other companies.
Merck partnered with a small firm called Ridgeback Biotherapeutics to develop the drug, which is called Molnupiravir. While the study results haven't yet been peer reviewed, at least one independent group of medical experts have given the research their blessing.
"This is a milestone in the fight against COVID," Dr. Gottlieb said.
So, is the prospect of a return to "normality" really on the table? I suppose we're about to find out.
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| Vatican to Punish Employees Who Refuse to Comply With COVID-19 Certification |
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Posted by: Stone - 10-01-2021, 07:49 AM - Forum: Pope Francis
- No Replies
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Vatican to Punish Employees Who Refuse to Comply With COVID-19 Certification
No jab, no salary.
Summit News [adapted] | 29 September, 2021
The Vatican is set to punish employees who refuse to comply with COVID-19 certification by not paying them.
Yes, really.
Vatican staffers who are unable to prove they’d been jabbed or who refuse to pay for expensive negative COVID tests will be considered “unjustly absent” and paid no salary.
The new rules will go into force from October 1st onwards.
As we highlighted last week, 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.
The unvaccinated were also banned from using long distance public transport, meaning that holidays, travel for work and visiting relatives has become impossible for many.
A sliver of good news is that Italians continue to hit the streets to protest the measures, with one video showing police officers removing their helmets in solidarity with the demonstrators.
Despite many Christians asserting a religious exemption to the vaccination, the Vatican itself is offering no such workaround.
Pope Francis has been a vehement supporter of the mass vaccination program, asserting that humanity “has a history of friendship with vaccines.”
“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,” reports the Mail.
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| October 1st – St. Remigius, Bishop and Confessor, Apostle of the Franks |
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Posted by: Stone - 10-01-2021, 07:36 AM - Forum: October
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October 1 – St. Remigius, Bishop and Confessor, Apostle of the Franks
Scarcely had two centuries elapsed since the triumph of the Cross over Roman idolatry, when Satan began to cry victory once more. While Eutychianism was crowned at Byzantium in the person of Anastasius the Silent, Arianism was rife in the West. Throughout the whole ancient territory of the empire, heresy was supreme, and almost everywhere was persecuting the Church, who had now none but the vanquished for her sons.
“But fear not; rather rejoice,” says Baronius at this point in his Annals; “it is Divine Wisdom still delighting to play in the world. The thoughts of men count for little before him who holds the light in his hands, to hide it when he pleases and, when he wills, to bring it forth again. The darkness that now covers the earth marks the hour when the dawn is about to break in the hearts of the Franks, and the Catholic faith is to shine there in all its glory.”
Little known in our days is such a manner of writing history; yet this was the view taken by the first historian of the Church, and the greatest. On such a feast as this we could not do better than repeat summarily his account of the Franks. “How,” says he, “can we help admiring that Providence which is never wanting to the Church? From the midst of tribes still pagan, on the morrow of the irremediable fall of the Empire, God forms to himself a new people, raises unto himself a prince: against these must break the rising tide of heretics and Barbarians. Such, in truth, appeared in the course of ages the divine mission of the Frankish kings.
“What energy has faith to uphold kingdoms; and what fatal power has heresy to uproot every plant that is not set by our heavenly Father! In proof hereof, see how the principalities of the Goths, Vandals, Heruli, Alani, Suevi, and Gepidi have utterly disappeared; while the Franks behold their little spot of earth blessedly fertilized, and encroaching far upon the surrounding territories.
“Henceforth appeared the might of the Franks, when preceded to battle by the Cross. Hitherto obscure and struggling for existence, they were now everywhere victorious. They had only had to acknowledge Christ in order to reach the highest summit of glory, honor, and renown. In so speaking I say nothing but what is known to the whole world. If they have been more favored than other nations, it is because they were supereminent in faith, and incomprable in piety, so that they were more eager to defend the Church than to protect their own frontiers.
“Moreover, a privilege unique and truly admirable was theirs: never did the sins of kings bring upon this people, as upon so many others, subjection to a foreign yoke. The promise of the Psalm would seem to have been renewed in favor of this nation: If his children forsake my law … and keep not my commandments, I will visit their iniquities with a rod … but my mercy I will not take away from him.”
All honor, then, to the saintly Pontiff, who merited to be the instrument of such heavenly benefits! According to the expression of the holy Pope Hormisdas, “Remigius converted the nation, and baptized Clovis, in the midst of prodigies similar to those of the apostolic age.” The prayers of Clotilde, and labors of Genevieve, the penances of the monks who peopled the forests of Gaul, had doubtless a great share in a conversion which brought such joy to the Angels. Did space allow, we might relate how it was also prepared by the great Bishops of the fifth century, Germanus of Auxerre, Lupus of Troyes, Anian of Orleans, Hilary of Arles, Memertus and Avitus of Vienne, Sidonius Apollinaris, and so many others who, in that age of darkness, held up the Church to the light of day, and commanded the respect of the Barbarians. Remigius, contemporary and survivor of most of them, and their rival in eloquence, nobility, and holiness, seemed to personify them all on that Christmas night forestalled by so many desires, prayers, and sufferings. In the baptistery of St. Mary’s at Rheims, the Frankish nation was born to God; as heretofore on the banks of the Jordan, the dove was again seen over the waters, honoring this time not the Baptism of Jesus, but that of the Church’s eldest daughter; it brought a gift from heaven, the holy vial containing the chrism which was to anoint the French kings in future ages into the most worthy of all the kings of the earth.
Two churches in the city of Rheims claim the honor of these glorious souvenirs: the grand church of our Lady, and the venerable basilica where Remigius lay, with the vial of chrism at his feet, and guarded by the twelve Peers surrounding his splendid mausoleum. This church of St. Remigius bore the name of caput Franciæ, head of all France, until those days of October 1793, when, from its desecrated pulpit was proclaimed the word that the days of darkness were at an end; when the holy ampulla was broken, and the relics of the Apostle of France were thrown into a common grave (they were, however, afterwards discovered and authentically recognized; and are, to this day, an object of the greatest veneration to pilgrims).
After an episcopate of seventy-four years, the longest ever recorded in history, Remigius took his flight to heaven on the 13th of January, the anniversary of his episcopal consecration and also of his birth. Yet in the same century, the first of October was chosen for his Feast; this being the day whereon his relics were first translated to a more honorable place, in the midst of miracles such as those which had graced his life. The Translation of St. Remigius is the name still given to this day by the church of Rheims, which, by a special privilege, celebrates on the Octave day of the Epiphany the principal festival of its glorious patron. We borrow the following Lessons from the Office of that day.
Quote:Remigius, also called Remedius, was born at Leon, of noble parents by name Æmilius and St. Celinia. They were far advanced in age, and renowned among their own people for their virtue, when the birth of this child was foretold to them by a blind hermit name Montanus; who afterwards recovered his sight, by applying to his eyes some of the milk wherewith the infant Remigius was nourished. The future Apostle of the Franks devoted his youth to prayer and study in retirement; but the more he shrank from the company of men, the more his fame spread throughout the province. On the death of Bennadius, Archbishop of Rheims, Remigius, who though but twenty-two years of age had the mature character of an old man, was unanimously elected, or rather forcibly installed as Archbishop. He endeavored to escape the burden of the episcopate, but was obliged by the command of God to submit. Having been consecrated by the bishops of the province, he governed his church with the wisdom of an experienced veteran. He was eloquent, learned in the Scriptures; and a pattern to his people, fulfilling in deed what he taught by word. He carefully and laboriously instructed his own flock in the mysteries of faith, and established discipline among his clergy. Then he undertook to spread the kingdom of Christ in Belgium; and having converted the people to the faith, he founded several new bishoprics and appointed them pastors: at Terouanne St. Antimund or Aumont, at Arras St. Vedast, and at Laon St. Genebald.
The wonderful works of Remigius, being divulged far and wide, filled with astonishment the minds of Clovis and his still pagan Franks. When Clovis, who had already conquered the Gauls, triumphed over the Alemanni also at the battle of Tolbiac, by the invocation of the name of Christ; he sent for Remigius, and willingly listened to his explanation of the Christin doctrine. Remigius urged the king to embrace the faith, but he replied that he feared the opposition of his people. When this was reported to the Franks, they cried out with one voice: “We renounce mortla gods, O pious king, and are ready to follow the immortal God whom Remigius preaches.” Then the Bishop imposed a fast upon them, according to the custom of the Church, and having, in the presence of the Queen St. Clotilde, completed the king’s religious instruction, he baptized him on the day of our Lord’s Nativity, addressing him in these words: “Bow down thy head in meekness, O Sicambrian; adore what thou hast hitherto burnt, burn what thou hast adored.” After the baptism, he anointed him with holy chrism with the sign of the cross of Christ. More than three thousand of the army were baptized, as also Albofleda, Clovis’ sister, who died soon after; upon which occasion Remigius wrote to console the king. His other sister, Lanthilda, was reclaimed from the Arian heresy, anointed with sacred chrism, and reconciled to the Church.
Remigius was exceedingly liberal to the poor and merciful towards sinners. “God has not placed us here,” he would say, “to exercise wrath, but to take care of men.” During a council, he once by divine power struck an Ariam bishop with dumbness, until he begged forgiveness by signs, when he restored him his speech with these words: “In the Name of our Lord Jesus Christ, if thou holdest the right belief concerning him, speak, and confess the faith of the Catholic Church.” The bishop recovering his voice, protested that he believed, and would die in, that faith. Towards the end of his life, Remigius lost his sight, but recovered it shortly before his death. Knowing the day of his departure, he celebrated Mass, and fortified his flock with the sacred Body of Christ. Then he bade his clergy and people farewell, giving to each one the kiss of our Lord’s peace; and full of days and good works, he departed this life on the Ides of January, in the years of our Lord five hundred and thirty-three, being ninety-six years old. He was buried in the oratory of St. Christopher; and as in life, so also after death, he was famous for miracles.
This is a fitting occasion to bring forward the beautiful forumula rightly called the Prayer of the Franks, which dates from the first ages of the monarchy.
Prayer
Omnipotens sempiterne Deus, qui ad instrumentum divinissimæ tuæ voluntatis per orbem et ad gladium et propugnaculum Ecclesiæ sanctæ tuæ, Francorum imperium constituisti: cœlesti lumine, quæsumus, filios Francorum supplicantes semper et ubique præveni: ut ea quæ agenda sunt ad regnum tuum in hos mundo efficiendum videant, et ad implenda quæ viderint charitate et fortitudine perseveranter convalescant.
Almighty, eternal God, who didst establish the empire of the Franks to be, throughout the world, the instrument of thy divine will, and the sword and bulwark of thy holy Church: ever and in all places prevent, we beseech thee, with thy heavenly light, the suppliant sons of the Franks; so that they may both see what they ought to do to promote thy kingdom in this world, and, in order to fulfill what they have seen, may continually increase in charity and in valor.
St. Leo IX said to his contemporaries, and we echo his words, concerning the land of France: “Be it known to your charity that you must solemnly celebrate the Feast of the blessed Remigius; for it to others he is not an Apostle, he is such with regard to you at least. Pay such honor, then, to your Apostle and Father, that you may merit, according to the divine promise, to live long upon the earth, and, by his prayers, may obtain possession of eternal beatitude.” When he thus spoke, the sovereign Pontiff has just consecrated thy church, then for the third time rebuilt with the magnificence required by the growing devotion of the people. The nine centuries since elapsed have augmented thy claims to the gratitude of a nation, into which thou didst infuse such vigorous life, that no other has equalled it in duration. Accept our thanks, O thou who wast as a new Sylvester to a new Constantine.
Glory be to our Lord, who showed forth his wonders in thee! Remembering those gestes of God accomplished in all climes by her sons the Franks, the Church recognizes (in the Rheims Lectionary) the legitimacy of applying to thee the beautiful words which announced the Messias: Give ear, ye islands, and hearken, ye people, from afar. The Lord hath called me from the womb … And he said: … Behold I have given thee to be the light of the Gentiles, that thou mayest be my salvation even to the farthest part of the earth. Truly it was a day of salvation, that Christmas day, whereon it pleased our Lord to bless thy labors and grant the desires of thy long episcopate. By the holy faith thou taughtest, thou wast then the covenant of the people, the new people composed of the conquerors and the conquered in that land of France, which, when once itself raised up, soon restored to God the inheritances that had been destroyed. O true Church, the one only Bride, captive and destitute, behold Remigius rises to say to thy sons that are bound: Come forth, and to them that are in darkness: Show yourselves! From North and South, from beyond the sea, behold they come in multitudes: all these are come to thee. Therefore, give praise, O ye heavens, and rejoice O earth, because the Lord hath comforted his people; after a whole century of heresy and barbarity, God has once more demonstrated that they shall not be confounded that wait for him.
Our confidence in God will again be rewarded if thou, O Remigius, deign to present to our Lord the prayer of the Franks who have remained faithful in honoring thy memory. The renegades sold over to Satan may tyrannize for a time over the deluded crowd; but they are not the nation. A day will come when Christ, who is ever King, will say to the Angels of his guard those words of his lieutenant Clovis: “It displeases me that these Goths possess the good land of France; expel them, for it belongs to us.”
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