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| Thomas à Kempis: Passion of Christ |
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Posted by: Stone - 02-14-2021, 08:52 AM - Forum: Lenten Devotions
- Replies (4)
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Prayers and Meditations on the Life of Christ
PART II - ON THE PASSION OF CHRIST, ACCORDING TO THE FOUR EVANGELISTS
[Of His Agony and Arrest]
CHAPTER I - Of the selling of Jesus by the perfidious traitor Judas
BLESS Thee, and give thanks to Thee, O Lord Jesus Christ, of Goodness supreme, of Majesty eternal, for the wicked sale of Thee by Thy own disciple, by whom Thou wast sold for so paltry and mean a price as thirty pieces of silver. I praise and glorify Thee for the surpassing meekness of Thy forbearance with that treacherous disciple, in that not only wast Thou not moved to anger, or to the use of harsh words, against him, but also (albeit Thou knewest the treachery against Thee which he was so soon to perpetrate) didst not at once make known his villainy to his fellow- disciples, nor didst suspend him from Holy Communion.
O most gentle Lord Jesus, how great is Thy patience, how great my impatience!
Woe is me that I find it so hard to bear with my brother, if aught is said or done to me which I do not like. Thou didst for so long a time uncomplainingly bear with Thy disciple Judas, who was shortly to sell and betray Thee: whereas I, for some slight wrong, fly at once into a passion, and concoct all sorts of plans for revenging or excusing myself. At such a time what becomes of my meekness, and of my patience?
Help me, O good Jesus, I beseech Thee, and instil into my heart more and more fully the virtue of Thy gentleness; for without Thy special grace preventing me, I cannot have the blessing of quietness of soul amidst the worries and the troubles, of which in this life there are so many.
CHAPTER II - Of the sadness and dread which Jesus endured for our sakes
BLESS Thee, and give thanks to Thee, O Lord Jesus Christ, Maker and Redeemer of all the faithful, for the sad beginning of Thy most bitter Passion ; for the exceeding distress of Thy soul; for the anxiety and dread, which, in the weakness of Thy human Nature, taken upon Thee of Thy own free will for our sakes, Thou didst feel, when, as the hour of Thy betrayal drew nigh. Thou didst begin to be fearful and very sad. Nor didst Thou think shame of confessing this sadness to Thy disciples, for Thou saidst: "My soul is sorrowful even unto death.'' O wondrous dispensation of God! Thou, the Lord of all power, Who but a short while since hadst given strength to Thy disciples for the strife, dost now bear Thyself as One Who is weak, and wanting in strength and courage.
And all this Thou didst undergo in order the more perfectly to comfort us in weakness and faint- heartedness, lest perchance some one of us, when sorely tempted, should despair of pardon or salvation; for if such an one should feel himself less cheerful than he should be under suffering, less brave than he should be, in enduring trials of the flesh, he may still be able to say that which Thou art recorded to have said: ''Nevertheless not as I will, but as Thou wilt.''
O most loving Jesus, my only hope in every trouble and distress, make me, I pray Thee, to ponder with a heart full of compassion, the sorrowful beginning of this Thy blessed Passion, and from this sad prelude to go on by degrees to meditate upon the still more bitter parts of it, that so I may be able, from each several part, to gather for the wounds of my soul some healing medicine.
Grant that I may bear with patient courage, for the glory of Thy Name, whatever troubles may be awaiting me, that I may never fall into despair, no matter how severe the tribulation may be, but may in all things resign myself to the good plea- sure of Thy Divine Providence.
CHAPTER III - The thrice-repeated prayer, the prostration before the Father of the Lord Jesus, and the resignation by Him of His Own Will
BLESS Thee, and give thanks to Thee, O Lord Jesus Christ, Stay of Angels, Refuge of the distressed, for Thy agonizing prayer, and Thy lowly falling flat upon the ground; when thrice, upon Thy bended knees, Thou didst earnestly and devoutly beseech Thy Heavenly Father that, if it were possible, the Chalice of Thy Passion might pass from Thee, and yet didst ever add the words: "Nevertheless not as I wilt, but as Thou wilt."
I praise and glorify Thee, for Thy mighty struggle against the fear of death, and of the anguish of Thy most bitter Passion; when the flame of Divine Love burnt so fiercely within Thee, as to thrust out all human fear.
I praise Thee, and give thanks to Thee, for the copious shedding of Thy Sweat of Blood; when, being in an Agony, Thou didst pray yet more fervently; and, against the order of nature, didst give out from Thy body, as sweat, drops of blood.
I adore Thee, and give Thee glory, for Thy humble acceptance of the angelic consolation, which Thou, the Maker and the King of the Heavenly Host, for the more strengthening of our feebleness, didst not disdain to receive at the hands of Angels: that so, weaklings as we are, we may be led to seek, not the comfort which is but for a moment, but that true strength which comes from above.
O most sweet Jesus, with what fervour of Love must Thou have loved me, that Thou didst pray for me so earnestly as to give forth — in Thy great desire to suffer for me — in place of natural sweat. Thy Own warm Blood, trickling down upon the ground.
O Almighty Creator of my soul, and perfect Pattern of my life, I praise Thee, and magnify Thee forever, for Thy boundless resignation; and for Thy complete conquest of Thy Own Will, and of all Thy feelings as a Man, which would have made Thee shrink from pain and death. I praise and magnify Thee for having at once, without the least wavering, when the hour of Thy Passion was at hand, resigned Thyself freely and willingly to Thy Father's Will, saying: " Father, not my will, but Thine, be done." Words indeed these were, with which Thou didst magnify Thy Heavenly Father's glory: didst heap further benefits upon us; didst yet more firmly tread the devil under foot; and didst show forth, to those who believe in Thee, more plainly than ever before, the model of perfection, the ensign of salvation, and the path of the highest virtue.
O adorable Jesus, Thou Whose example we must ever keep before us, grant, I most earnestly beseech Thee, that I may obtain the fruit of this Thy thrice-repeated prayer, and that in the life in Religion which I have taken upon myself, I may strive to imitate the example of Thy self-denial. Give me grace manfully to bring into subjection to the spirit the stubbornness of my flesh; to crush all shrinking from bodily pain; to use prayer more often than before; to be ever watchful therein; to trust lovingly to Thee for help; to leave confidently in Thy hands the issue of all my undertakings; utterly to renounce my own will in everything; and to be always ready courageously to bear whatever troubles may come upon me.
CHAPTER IV - How the Lord Jesus went to meet His betrayer
BLESS Thee, and give thanks to Thee, O Lord Jesus Christ, our Saviour and Deliverer, for Thy cheerful readiness to suffer; in that, after Thou hadst offered to God the Father Thy thrice-repeated prayer, when Thy most cruel enemies, and Judas, Thy most wicked betrayer, came, in the dead of night, with a great multitude, with swords and clubs, and torches and weapons, to take Thee, as if Thou hadst been a robber. Thou didst at once Thyself go forth to meet them, saying: " Whom seek ye ?I am He. If therefore you seek Me, let these go their way." At which first word indeed of Thy power all that arrogant boldness of theirs was discomfited, and utterly put to confusion. For, as soon as Thou hadst said this unto them, they went backwards and fell to the ground. What then would have happened if, at Thy bidding, twelve legions of angels had come upon them? But it was to suffer that Thou hadst come into the world, and so, instead of using Thy Divine power, Thou didst will to show forth Thy most gracious forbearance. Thou hadst made plain, by one short word, the Majesty of Thy power: and now Thou didst allow those impious men to have dominion over Thee, and to wreak their venomous spite against Thee for a season; that so Thou mightest make it plain that it was of Thy own free will that Thou wast entering upon Thy Passion, for the accomplishment of the work of our redemption, and for the fulfilment of the Scriptures of the Prophets.
I praise and glorify Thee, O Lord Jesus Christ, most innocent Lamb of God, for Thy unspeakable gentleness, and for Thy invincible spirit of meekness, in that Thou wast not inflamed with anger against Thy most wicked betrayer, and didst not indignantly turn Thy back upon him, but rather
didst deign to enter into friendly conversation with him ; and addressing him with Thy wonted kindness, didst suffer him, unworthy as he was, to kiss Thy most sweet Lips, saying to him: " Friend, whereto art thou come?" — rebuking at the same time his wicked and deceitful insolence with those gentle words: "Judas, dost thou betray the Son of Man with a kiss? " He alas! who had been one of the company of Thy apostles, neither fearing Thee as his Judge, nor pitying Thee as his friend, shrank not from his most horrible villainy; but putting himself at the head of that band of evil men, gave them a sign, saying: "Whomsoever I shall kiss, that is He, hold Him fast!” O vilest disciple of a Master most loving! O servant most perfidious of a Master most faithful!
O how wonderful was Thy love, how splendid was that patience of Thine, O most meek, most loving Jesus, Who even at the time of such an arrest, of so base a betrayal, didst not forget Thy old friendship and tenderness! Thou didst repay so great a wrong by bestowing a gift of healing; making whole, by the touch of Thy sacred Hand, the ear of the High Priest's servant which Thy disciple had cut off, and bidding Peter himself, when he would have protected Thee from Thy assailants, to hold his hand, saying: "Put up again thy sword into its place. The chalice which My Father hath given Me, shall I not drink it? For thus it must be."
Now, therefore, O my God, I beseech Thee to give to me, frail reed that I am, greater patience when things go wrong with me; and when my enemies insult me, or when charges are brought against me, of which I know myself to be innocent, let not sudden anger get the better of me, nor a love of revenge stir me up to render railing for railing. Grant me grace not to shrink from being found fault with; but to take reproaches in good part, and to think him my friend who blames or disparages me the most. Give me grace not to feel angry at any harshness shown me, and not to bear malice for any unjust complaint made against me; but to let the thought of Thy most gentle endurance of the wrongs done to Thee strengthen me to rejoice in my own, and fill me with a desire to suffer even worse things for love of Thee.
CHAPTER V - The fell seizure and leading away of the Lord Jesus
BLESS Thee, and give thanks to Thee, O Lord Jesus Christ, Hope of the Saints, and their strong Tower in every distress, for the violent seizure of Thee by Thy hateful enemies; for the insolent laying upon Thee of the sacrilegious hands of those who sought to hold Thee; for the fierce looks they cast upon Thee ; for the threatening shouts of the soldiers; for their rough and cruel binding of Thee; for their rude and ungentle holding of Thee fast; for their hasty and disorderly leading away of Thee; for the contumely and the violence with which they dragged Thee along; when, with wild tumult, Thou wast hurried away by vile and worthless scoundrels to Thy death; while the disciples, who were so dear to Thee, either fled, or with eyes full of grief and sorrow looked upon Thee from afar.
O King of Kings, O Lord Who rulest over all Thy creatures, and alone among mortals art free, how couldst Thou bear to be thus violently seized by evil hands, and to be led away in such contumely and disgrace, by men whom Thou hadst Thyself created, and to whom Thou hadst always done good? Alas! how grievous was the crime committed against Thee, how audacious the insult to Thy sovereign Majesty, when Thou, the Deliverer of souls, wast bound with a malefactor's cord; when Thou, Who wast altogether free from sin, wast led away a prisoner, as if Thou hadst been the vilest of robbers ! But Thou, my most loving Jesus, supreme Author of all virtues, didst will to endure all these things most patiently for our sakes, that so Thou mightest set us an example of perfect meekness, and mightest fulfil that most plain of the prophecies of Isaias: “He shall be led as a sheep to the slaughter, and shall be dumb as a lamb before His shearer, and He shall not open His mouth. He was offered because it was His own will.”
Compassionate, then, O my soul, thy most loving Lord God, an ill-used prisoner, enduring of His own free will all these things because of thy sins. Groan deeply, and let thine eyes be wet with tears of sorrow, at the thought of the Only-Begotten Son of God being treated with such indignity for thy sake. See what those most insolent dogs, the wicked Jews, are doing. They hold Jesus captive, they lead Him bound before Annas, and before Caiaphas the High Priest: but when He is seized He does not resist; when He is bound He does not complain; when He is led away He does not struggle with His captors; when He is being dragged along He utters no ill-word; but He goes meekly on, is quiet as a lamb, follows His captors as One Who is guiltless, bears everything as One Who is humility itself.
I pray Thee, then, O my God, that the thought of the bitterness of the grievous restraint thus put upon Thee may sink deep into my heart; may often rouse me, and chiefly at the hour of Matins, to fervour in the Divine Office; may drive from me all listlessness; and may make me constant, active, and watchful, in praising Thee, that so I may at least make some return for Thy love, and for the hardships endured by Thee, Who, for my sake, at night-time wast born, and at night-time wast betrayed, wast seized, and wast bound with cords. At night-time, therefore, O Lord, will I ever remember Thy Holy Name, calling to mind what great things Thou hast suffered for me, the chief of sinners.
May Thy painful bonds win for me true liberty, may they hold me back from unprofitable wandering abroad, and by strong discipline keep me ever in Thy service. May I not find it hard to overcome and get rid of self; and may I with a willing heart follow along the path of obedience the injunctions of my superiors, not shrinking from being led whither I would not, provided only that the command be such as is pleasing to Thee.
May I never be found rebellious, quarrelsome, insolent, or noisy; but always kind, tractable and sober-minded; that so I may walk in the way of Thy commandments, and with humble devotion may observe the rites and ceremonies of Holy Church. Bow Thou down my neck to observe the rules of my Order, and bind my hands to fulfil the holy toil assigned to me. May roaming and idleness ever be distasteful to me; stiff-necked and self-willed as I am by nature, may an austere life, and the subdual of my own inclinations be made to me my greatest happiness; and may I have grace to bring my own inner life, at least in some small measure, into conformity with the example which Thou didst set, when Thou wast bound, and held captive.
CHAPTER VI - The forsaking of the Lord Jesus, and the flight of the Apostles
BLESS Thee, and give thanks to Thee, O Lord Jesus Christ, good Shepherd and gracious Master, for Thy most sad abandonment and for Thy loneliness, in the extremity of Thy need; when Thou wast left, by all Thy disciples and friends, quite alone in the midst of Thy most cruel enemies. For Thy brethren, and Thy familiar friends — who had promised to die, and to give their lives, for Thee —when the need came, one and all forsook Thee and fled.
I praise and glorify Thee, for that tenderness of Heart, which caused Thee to suffer so cruelly from the cowardice with which Thy disciples turned their backs on Thee and deserted Thee, when leaving Thee their Shepherd in the midst of wolves, they were dispersed like sheep, every one to his own, even as Thou hadst foretold to them.
Great indeed must have been the sadness, great indeed the anguish and the grief, which possessed
the hearts of the disciples when they beheld their Lord and Master, Whom they had left all to follow, so violently torn from them, and hurried away to death. But Thou, O Lord, to Whom all things are known, and Who dost not allow anything to hap- pen without its fulfilling some purpose of Thy own, didst permit these chosen vessels of Thine to show such great weakness in order that out of it greater good might come. From this fall, in short, it was that they were led to know their own frailty, and to sympathize with that of other weak brethren ; and so ever afterwards they remained more distrustful of themselves, more fervent in spirit, more humble and more devout.
How useful is it for me to meditate diligently upon this subject, and never to think too highly of myself; for although when in prayer I do sometimes have the grace of renewed fervour, yet I know not how long it will last, nor what may be in store for me in time of temptation. If the pillars of heaven, the Apostles of Christ, gave way in time of tribulation, what is a most frail and unprofitable weakling likely to do, when even a slight temptation assails him? Some indeed, O Lord, would cry shame upon Thy holy Apostles for their base desertion of Thee, and because, being beside themselves from fear, they tried to escape; but such men forget what an every dav thing it is for them to go astray under the stress of love or hate, as the case may be.
Do not, then, I pray Thee, my most dear Lord, suffer me to fall a victim to so great spiritual madness, as ever to turn aside from any holy purpose which I have taken in hand; and grant me grace to follow Thee whithersoever Thou goest, be it to life or to death. May I never forsake Thee in time of adversity, nor be drawn away by my own lusts so as to fall into sin; but may I rather, for the love of Thee, and in pursuit of what is good, play the man, by remaining firm under straits and hardships, of whatever kind; lest, at any time, through my own fault, I should come to lose Thee, my Highest Good. Let not the foot of pride come against me as concerning any good works done by me, nor let me ever join Peter in speaking presumptuously, putting myself before some one else, or claiming to be as good as others; but may 1 do everything in Thy fear, humbly remembering my own weakness. May the fall of holy Peter, and the flight of the apostles, be no stumbling-block to me ; but may these things rather be a warning against sin. May the restoration of Thy apostles to Thy favour, which followed upon their repentance, give me a strong hope of again obtaining mercy after a fall of my own — for there is no one so holy as never to fall into venial sin of some kind — and when it so happens that my friends and acquaintances turn away from me, or those whom I love well think evil of me, and treat me as one who is of no account, and as it were a stranger to them; then, O Lord, grant that I may, for my own comfort, keep in mind Thy most grievous desertion and rejection, and count it gain to be deprived of all human consolation, if only I may thereby, in my small degree, be conformed to what Thou hadst to undergo.
Forgive me, O most merciful Jesus, for having so often offended Thee; for having been so ready to go astray after that which has profited me nothing ; for not having kept my heart steadfastly fixed upon that which I had resolved to do. Also, when I consider my ways, how often do I find that I waste my time upon vain things which can never profit, and fail, alas, in keeping Thy sacred Passion ever in my view! Thou hast trodden the narrow way before me, and I pass by without a tear, as if Thy anguish were no concern of mine. Take pity, I pray Thee, upon my cold dull heart, and fill it with a loving remembrance of Thy most bitter Passion.
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| Archbishop Lefebvre: On Lenten Practices |
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Posted by: Stone - 02-14-2021, 08:35 AM - Forum: Lenten Devotions
- Replies (1)
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On Fasting and Abstinence
Pray and do penance. Do penance in order to pray better, in order to draw closer to Almighty God.
In his Lenten message of February 1982, Archbishop Marcel Lefebvre addresses the important subject of fasting and abstinence, especially in light of the newer, relaxed regulations instituted by Pope Paul VI in his apostolic constitution, Paenitemini.
Quote:My dear brethren,
According to an ancient and salutary tradition in the Church, on the occasion of the beginning of Lent, I address these words to you in order to encourage you to enter into this penitential season wholeheartedly, with the dispositions willed by the Church and to accomplish the purpose for which the Church prescribes it.
If I look in books from the early part of this century, I find that they indicate three purposes for which the Church has prescribed this penitential time:
First - in order to curb the concupiscence of the flesh; Then - to facilitate the elevation of our souls toward divine realities; Finally - to make satisfaction for our sins.
Our Lord gave us the example during His life, here on earth: pray and do penance. However, Our Lord, being free from concupiscence and sin, did penance and made satisfaction for our sins, thus showing us that our penance may be beneficial not only for ourselves but also for others.
Pray and do penance. Do penance in order to pray better, in order to draw closer to Almighty God. This is what all the saints have done, and this is that of which all the messages of the Blessed Virgin remind us.
Would we dare to say that this necessity is less important in our day and age than in former times? On the contrary, we can and we must affirm that today, more than ever before, prayer and penance are necessary because everything possible has been done to diminish and denigrate these two fundamental elements of Christian life.
Never before has the world sought to satisfy - without any limit, the disordered instincts of the flesh, even to the point of the murder of millions of innocent, unborn children. One would come to believe that society has no other reason for existence except to give the greatest material standard of living to all men in order that they should not be deprived of material goods.
Thus we can see that such a society would be opposed to what the Church prescribes. In these times, when even Churchmen align themselves with the spirit of this world, we witness the disappearance of prayer and penance - particularly in their character of reparation for sins and obtaining pardon for faults.
Few there are today who love to recite Psalm 50, the Miserere, and who say with the psalmist, Peccatum meum contra me est simper - "My sin is always before me."
How can a Christian remove the thought of sin if the image of the crucifix is always before his eyes?
At the Council the bishops requested such a diminution of fast and abstinence that the prescriptions have practically disappeared. We must recognize the fact that this disappearance is a consequence of the ecumenical and Protestant spirit which denies the necessity of our participation for the application of the merits of Our Lord to each one of us for the remission of our sins and the restoration of our divine affiliation [i.e., our character as adoptive sons of God].
In the past the commandments of the Church provided for:
+ An obligatory fast on all days of Lent with the exception of Sundays, for the three Ember Days and for many Vigils;
+ Abstinence was for all Fridays of the year, the Saturdays of Lent and, in numerous dioceses, all the Saturdays of the year.
What remains of these prescriptions - the fast for Ash Wednesday and Good Friday and abstinence for Ash Wednesday and the Fridays of Lent?
One wonders at the motives for such a drastic diminution. Who are obliged to observe the fast? - adults from age 21 to 60 [In the USA, the minimum age is 18 years old - Ed.]. And who are obliged to observe abstinence? - all the faithful from the age of 7 years.
What does fasting mean? To fast means to take only one (full) meal a day to which one may add two collations
(or small meals), one in the morning, one in the evening which, when combined, do not equal a full meal. [The archbishop is referring to the European order of meals; in the United States though, dinner is usually the evening meal - Ed.]
What is meant by abstinence? By abstinence is meant that one abstains from meat.
The faithful who have a true spirit of faith and who profoundly understand the motives of the Church which have been mentioned above, will wholeheartedly accomplish not only the light prescriptions of today but, entering into the spirit of Our Lord and of the Blessed Virgin Mary, will endeavor to make reparation for the sins which they have committed and for the sins of their family, their neighbors, friends and fellow citizens.
It is for this reason that they will add to the actual prescriptions. These additional penances might be to fast for all Fridays of Lent, abstinence from all alcoholic beverages, abstinence from television, or other similar sacrifices.
They will make an effort to pray more, to assist more frequently at the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass, to recite the rosary, and not to miss evening prayers with the family.
They will detach themselves from their superfluous material goods in order to aid the seminaries, help establish schools, help their priests adequately furnish the chapels and to help establish novitiates for nuns and brothers.
The prescriptions of the Church do not concern fast and abstinence alone but also of the obligation of the Paschal Communion (Easter Duty).
Here is what the Vicar of the Diocese of Sion, in Switzerland, recommended to the faithful of that diocese on February 20, 1919:
Quote:+ During Lent, the pastors will have the Stations of the Cross twice a week; one day for the children of the schools and another day for the other parishioners. After the Stations of the Cross, they will recite the Litany of the Sacred Heart.
+ During Passion Week, which is to say, the week before Palm Sunday, there will be a Triduum in all parish churches, Instruction, Litany of the Sacred Heart in the Presence of the Blessed Sacrament, Benediction. In these instructions the pastors will simply and clearly remind their parishioners of the principal conditions to receive the Sacrament of Penance worthily.
+ The time during which one may fulfill the Easter Duty has been set for all parishes from Passion Sunday to the first Sunday after Easter.
Why should these directives no longer be useful today? Let us profit from this salutary time during the course of which Our Lord is accustomed to dispense grace abundantly. Let us not imitate the foolish virgins who having no oil in their lamps found the door of the bridegroom's house closed and this terrible response: Nescio vos - "I know you not."
Blessed are they who have the spirit of poverty for theirs is the kingdom of heaven. The spirit of poverty means the spirit of detachment from things of this world.
Blessed are they who weep for they shall be consoled. Let us think of Jesus in the Garden of Olives who wept for our sins. It is henceforth for us to weep for our sins and for those of our brethren.
Blessed are they who hunger and thirst for holiness for they shall be satisfied. Holiness - sanctity is attained by means of the Cross, penance and sacrifice. If we truly seek perfection then we must follow the Way of the Cross.
May we, during this Lenten Season, hear the call of Jesus and Mary and engage ourselves to follow them in this crusade of prayer and penance.
May our prayers, our supplications, and our sacrifices obtain from heaven the grace that those in places of responsibility in the Church return to her true and holy traditions, which is the only solution to revive and reflourish the institutions of the Church again.
Let us love to recite the conclusion of the Te Deum: In te Doming, speravi; non confundar in aeternum "In Thee, O Lord, I have hoped. I will not be confounded in eternity."
+ Marcel Lefebvre Sexagesima Sunday February 14, 1982 Rickenbach, Switzerland
Guidelines for Traditional Penitential Practices
Traditional rules of fast and abstinence as observed per the 1962 liturgical calendar and outlined in Canons 1250-1254 of the 1917 Code of Canon Law.
Who was bound to observe these laws?
+ The law of abstinence bound all Catholics, beginning on the day after their 7th birthday.
+ The law of fasting bound all Catholics, beginning on the day after their 21st birthday and ending at the midnight which completed their 59th birthday. [Note: The USA's particular law has lowered the obligatory fasting age to 18.]
What was forbidden and allowed to be eaten?
+ The law of abstinence forbade the eating of flesh meat and of broth made of meat, but did not exclude the use of eggs, dairy products, or seasonings made from the fat of animals.
+ The law of fasting prescribed that only one full meal a day was taken with two smaller meals that did not equal the main one.
In the Universal Church
Abstinence was obligatory on all Fridays, except on Holy Days of Obligation outside of Lent. Fasting and complete abstinence were obligatory on the following days:
Ash Wednesday Fridays and Saturdays in Lent Good Friday Holy Saturday Ember Days Vigil of Pentecost Vigil of Christmas
Partial Abstinence
Fasting and partial abstinence were obligatory on all other weekdays of Lent . ( i.e ., Monday through Thursday - Friday was always complete abstinence) This meant that meat could be eaten at the principal meal on these days.
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| Quinquagesima Sunday |
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Posted by: Stone - 02-14-2021, 07:38 AM - Forum: Lent
- Replies (7)
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QUINQUAGESIMA SUNDAY
Taken from Fr. Leonard Goffine's Explanations of the Epistles and Gospels for the Sundays, Holydays, and Festivals throughout the Ecclesiastical Year - 36th edition, 1880
The Introit of this day's Mass is the sigh of an afflicted soul confiding in God: Be thou unto me a God, a protector, and a place of refuge, to save me: for thou art my strength and my refuge: and for thy name's sake thou wilt be my leader, and wilt nourish me. (Ps. xxx. 3.4.) In thee, O Lord! I have hoped, let me never be confounded: deliver me in thy justice, and set me free. (Ps. xxx. 2.)
PRAYER OF THE CHURCH. Lord, we beseech Thee, graciously hear our prayers, and unloosing the bonds of our sins, guard us from all adversity. Through our Lord, &c.
EPISTLE. (i. Cor. xiii. I — 13.) Brethren, if I speak with the tongues of men and of angels, and have not charity, I am become as sounding brass or a tinkling cymbal. And if I should have prophecy, and know all mysteries and all knowledge, and if I should have all faith, so that I could remove mountains, and have not charity, I am nothing. And if I should distribute all my goods to feed the poor, and if I should deliver my body to be burned, and have not charity, it profiteth me nothing. Charity is patient, is kind: charity envieth not; dealeth not perversely; is not puffed up; is not ambitious; seeketh not her own; is not provoked to anger; thinketh no evil; rejoiceth not in iniquity, but rejoiceth in the truth ; beareth all things, believeth all things, hopeth all things, endureth all things. Charity never falleth away: whether prophecies shall be made void, or tongues shall cease, or knowledge shall be destroyed. For we know in part, and we prophesy in part: but when that which is perfect is come, that which is in part shall be done away. When I was a child, I spoke as a child, I understood as a child, I thought as a child: but when I became a man, I put away the things of a child. We see now through a glass in a dark manner; but then face to face. Now I know in part; but then I shall know even as I am known. And now there remain faith, hope, charity, these three: but the greatest of these is charity.
Quote:EXPLANATION. In this epistle St. Paul speaks of the necessity, the excellence, and the nature of true charity. He says, that all natural and supernatural gifts, all good works, even martyrdom, cannot save us if we have not charity; because love alone can render our works pleasing to God. Without charity, therefore, though ever so many prayers be recited, fasts observed, and good deeds performed, nothing will be acceptable to God, or merit eternal life. Strive then, O Christian soul, to lead a pious life in love, and to remain always in the state of grace.
Can faith alone, as the so-called Reformers assert, render man just, and save him?
Faith alone, however strong, though it could move mountains, without love, that is, without good works performed for love of God and our neighbor, can never justify or save us. For, when St. Paul says, that man is justified by faith without works, (Rom. iii. 28.; xi. 6.; Eph. ii. 8. 9.) he means to refer to those works which were performed by command of the law of Moses, and which, as they were external and without true charity, were of no avail; he did not refer to those works which are performed in a state of grace with a lively, love-inspired faith. Therefore the same Apostle writes to the Galatians: (Gal. v. 6.) Faith only availeth which worketh by charity; to Titus: (Tit. iii. 8.) It is a faithful saying: and these things I will have thee affirm constantly: that they who believe in God, may be careful to excel in good works. These things are good and profitable unto men; and he exhorts the Colossians (Colos. i. 10.) to be fruitful in every good work. St. James confirms the same by saying: (James ii. 17. 24.) So faith if it have not works, is dead in itself; by works man is justified and not by faith only. That this is the true doctrine of Christ, is evident from His own words. when He says: "Every tree that bringeth not forth good fruit, shall be cut down, and shall be cast into the fire." (Matt. vii. 19.) At the day of judgment Christ will demand good works from all men, (Matt. xxv. 35.) and will not judge them only according to their faith, but by their good works, which true faith must always produce. (Apoc. xx. 12.) Would Christ and His apostles demand good works, if faith alone be sufficient? "The devils also believe and tremble.'' (James ii. 19.) they believe, but they are not saved, and their faith but increases their torments. Therefore, the assertion that faith without good works is sufficient for justification and salvation, is plainly against the doctrine of Christ and His Church, and must of necessity lead man to vice and misery, as shown by the history of the unhappy separation of the sixteenth century.
Are good works available which are performed in the state of mortal sin ?
Good works performed while in a state of mortal sin avail nothing in regard to eternal life, writes St. Lawrence Justinian, but aid in moderating the punishment imposed for disobedience and the transgression of God's commandments. They bring temporal goods, such as honor, long life, health, earthly happiness, etc; they prevent us from falling deeper into sin, and prepare the heart for the reception of grace; so the pious Gerson writes: "Do as much good as you can even though in the state of mortal sin, that God may give light to your heart."
ASPIRATION. God of love, pour the spirit of true charity into my heart that, according to the spirit of St. Paul. I may endeavor to be always in a
state of grace, that all my works may be pleasing to Thee, and meritorious for me.
GOSPEL. (Luke xviii. 31 —43.) At that time, Jesus took unto him the twelve, and said to them: Behold, we go up to Jerusalem, and all things shall be accomplished which were written by the prophets concerning the Son of Man. For he shall be delivered to the Gentiles, and shall be mocked, and scourged, and spit upon; and after they have scourged him, they will put him to death; and the third day he shall rise again. And they understood none of these things, and this word was hid from them, and they understood not the things that were said. Now it came to pass, when he drew nigh to Jericho, that a certain blind man sat by the way-side, begging. And when he heard the multitude passing by, he asked what this meant. And they told him that Jesus of Nazareth was passing by. And he cried out, saying: Jesus, Son of David, have mercy on me. And they that went before rebuked him, that he should hold his peace. But he cried out much more: Son of David, have mercy on me. And Jesus standing, commanded him to be brought unto him. And when he was come near, he asked him. saying: What wilt thou that I do to thee? But he said: Lord, that I may see. And Jesus said to him: Receive thy sight; thy faith hath made thee whole. And immediately he saw, and followed him, glorifying God: and all the people, when they saw it, gave praise to God.
Why did Christ so often foretell His passion to His disciples?
Because He wanted to show how great was His desire to suffer for us, for we speak often of that which we crave; and because He wished His disciples when they should see Him treated as a criminal and martyred, not to think evil of Him, or imagine themselves deceived, but remember, that He had foretold all, minutely, that all happened of His own will.
Did not the disciples understand anything of what He predicted in regard to His future sufferings?
They may, certainly, have well understood He was to suffer, for which reason Peter tried to dissuade Him from it; (Matt. xvi. 22.) but they did not comprehend why or for what He would suffer, or how He would rise again. All this the Holy Ghost gave them to understand, after it had come to pass. (John xiv. 26.) The light of the Holy Ghost is of so much value, that without it even the clearest doctrines of faith are not understood.
Why does Christ so often call Himself the Son of Man?
He wished to show, in the Jewish way of speaking, He was also man, a descendant of Adam, and that we should be humble, and not seek or desire high titles.
Why did the blind man call Christ the Son of David?
Because, like all the Jews, he believed that the Messiah, according to humanity, would be of the house of David, as was promised. (Ps. cxxxi. n.)
Why did Christ ask the blind man: What wilt thou that I do to thee?
This He asked, not because He was unaware of the blind man's wish, but to enable him the better to prove his faith and hope that through Christ he would receive his sight; and to teach us how willing He is to help us, and how it pleases Him if we confidingly place our wants before Him. We should learn from this blind man, who would not be restrained by the passing crowd in his ardent and reiterated request, not to pay attention, in the work we have commenced, to human respect, or human judgment, but to persevere, and not allow ourselves to be led astray by the world's mockery or contempt. We should also learn to be grateful to God, and faithfully cling to Him, if He has once opened the eyes of our mind, and healed our spiritual blindness, which is far more deplorable than physical blindness , for nothing can be more miserable than not to see and understand God, not to know what is necessary for our salvation, and what is pernicious.
Why is this gospel read on this Sunday?
The Church wishes to remind us of the painful passion and death of Jesus, and to move us by the contemplation of those mysteries to avoid and despise the wicked, heathenish amusements of carnival, sinful pleasures which she has always condemned, because they come from dark paganism, and, to avert the people from them, commands that during the three days of carnival the Blessed Sacrament shall be exposed for public adoration, sermons given, and the faithful exhorted to have recourse at this time to the Sacraments of Penance and the Blessed Sacrament of the Altar, with the reception of which Pope Clement XIII. (Breve, 23. June 176s) connected a plenary indulgence. A true Catholic will conform to the desire of
his holy Church, considering the words which St. Augustine spoke, at this time, to the faithful. "The heathens (as also the worldly people of our days) shout songs of love and merriment, but you should delight in the preaching of the word of God; they rush to the dramatic plays, but you should hasten to Church; they are intoxicated, but you should fast and be sober."
PRAYER. O most benign Jesus! who didst so desire to suffer for us, grant, that we may willingly suffer for love of Thee: that we may hate and flee from the detestable; pleasures of the world and the flesh, and practice penance and mortification, that by so doing we may merit to be released from our spiritual blindness to love Thee more and more ardently, and finally possess Thee forever.
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| April 3rd - St. Richard of Chichester |
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Posted by: Elizabeth - 02-14-2021, 12:06 AM - Forum: April
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Saint Richard of Chichester
Bishop
(1197-1253)
Saint Richard of Chichester was born in 1197 in a little town a few miles from Worcester, England. He and his elder brother were left orphans while still young, and his brother was imprisoned as a result of their property's unpaid debts. Richard gave up the studies which he loved, to farm his brother's impoverished estate. His brother, in gratitude for Richard's successful labors, proposed to turn over to him all his lands; but he refused both the estates and the offer of a brilliant marriage, to study for the priesthood at Oxford.
In 1235 Saint Richard was appointed, for his learning and piety, chancellor of that University and afterwards chancellor of his diocese by Saint Edmund, Archbishop of Canterbury. The new Chancellor stood by the Saint in his long contest with the king, and then accompanied him into exile in France, in the Abbey of Pontigny. After Saint Edmund's death there, he studied theology in Orleans before returning to England to toil as a simple parish priest. He was, however, soon elected by the Canons of Chichester, when their see became vacant, for their Bishop. This election greatly displeased the king, who had nominated another candidate whom the Canons judged unworthy.
The king in revenge refused to recognize the election, and seized the revenues of the see. Thus Saint Richard found himself fighting the same battle in which Saint Edmund had died. He went to Lyons, where he was consecrated bishop by Innocent IV in 1245, and returning to England he exercised fully his episcopal rights despite his poverty and the king's hostility, and thoroughly reformed his see. Young and old loved Saint Richard, and after two years his revenues were restored. To feed the poor and heal the sick, he gave all he had and worked miracles; and when the rights or the sanctity of the Church were concerned, he was inexorable.
A priest of noble blood polluted his office by sin; Richard deprived him of his benefice, and refused the king's petition in his favor. On the other hand, when a knight violently imprisoned a priest, Richard compelled the knight to walk around the priest's church with the same log of wood on his neck to which he had chained him. And when the burgesses of Lewes tore a criminal from the church and hanged him, Richard made them dig up the body from its unconsecrated grave, and bear it back to the sanctuary they had violated. Richard died in 1253 while preaching, at the Pope's command, a crusade against the Saracens.
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| April 2nd - St. Francis of Paula |
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Posted by: Elizabeth - 02-14-2021, 12:04 AM - Forum: April
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Saint Francis of Paula
Thaumaturge, Founder
(1416-1507)
At the age of fifteen, Saint Francis left his poor home at Paula in Calabria, Italy, to live as a hermit in a cave on the seacoast. In time disciples gathered around him, and with them, in 1436, he founded the Order of the Minims. He chose this name that they might always consider themselves the least of monastic Orders. They observed a perpetual Lent, never touching meat, fish, eggs, or milk. Francis himself made the rock his bed; his best garment was a hair shirt, and boiled herbs were his only fare. His first consideration in all things was Caritas, charity.
Saint Francis was a thaumaturge, which denomination indicates a miracle-worker known for his virtually unceasing wonders. The Church recognizes that God, as a rule, does not raise up more than one every century. He cured the sick, raised the dead, averted plagues, expelled evil spirits, and brought sinners to penance. But opposition arose; a famous preacher, misled by a few misguided monks, set to work to preach against Saint Francis and his miracles. The Saint took no notice of it, and the preacher, finding that he made no way with his hearers, determined to go to see this poor hermit whom he did not know, and confound him in person. The Saint received him kindly, gave him a seat by the fire, and listened to a long exposition of his own frauds. He then quietly took some glowing embers from the fire, and closing his hands upon them unhurt, said, Come, Father Anthony, warm yourself, for you are shivering for want of a little charity. Father Anthony, falling at the Saint's feet, asked for pardon, and then, having received his embrace, left him, to become his panegyrist and himself attain great perfection.
When the avaricious King Ferdinand of Naples offered him a gift of money for his convent, Francis told him to give it back to his oppressed subjects, and softened his heart by causing blood to flow from the ill-gotten coin.
King Louis XI of France, trembling at the approach of death, sent for the poor hermit to come and ward off the foe whose advance neither his fortresses nor his guards could check. Francis went at the Pope's command, leaving his country and his foundations there, which he foretold he would not see again; and he prepared the king for a pious death. He set the court to marveling when a delicately seasoned fish, which the king had ordered prepared for his guest's dinner, swam away after Saint Francis cast it into the pool from which it had been taken. And the successors of King Louis showered favors on their remarkable guest, desiring him to remain in France. It was God's will that retained him there.
His Rule for the Order of Minims was adopted also by women religious, and spread throughout Europe; a less rigorous Rule was adapted for the Third Order Secular for those who desired a life of penance in their state. His name was reverenced everywhere in the Christian world; his prophecies were, during his lifetime, and are still today, held in great veneration. He died at the age of ninety-one, on Good Friday, 1507, with the crucifix in his hand and the last words of Jesus on his lips: Into Thy hands, O Lord, I commend my spirit.
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| Trustful Surrender to Divine Providence by Father Jean Baptiste Saint-Jure |
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Posted by: Hildegard of Bingen - 02-13-2021, 09:38 PM - Forum: Articles by Catholic authors
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The Will of God Made and Governs All Things
1. God controls all events, whether good or bad How can God will or allow evil?
Practical examples
2. God does everything with supreme wisdom
Trials and punishments are blessings from God and proof of His mercy
Our trials are never greater than our strength to bear them Treating of the Will of God St. Thomas, following St.
Augustine, teaches that it is the cause of all that exists. 1 The Psalmist tells us that "all that the Lord wills He does in heaven and
on earth, in the seas and in all the deeps." 2 Again in the Book of the Apocalypse it is written: "Worthy art thou, O Lord our God, to
receive glory and honor and power; for thou hast created all things, and because of thy will they existed and were created. " 3
Hence it is the Will of God which from nothingness drew out the universe with all its grandeur and all that lives in it, the earth
with all that is on it and beneath it, all creatures visible and invisible, living and inanimate, reasonable and without reason, from the
highest to the lowest.
If God then has produced all these things, as St. Paul says, according to the purpose of His will, 4 is it not supremely right and
reasonable as well as absolutely necessary that they should be preserved and governed by Him according to the counsel of His will?
And how could a thing remain, unless you willed it; or be preserved, had it not been called forth by you? 5 But the works of God
are perfect it is written in the Canticle of Moses. 6 They are so well done that God Himself, whose judgment is strict and righteous,
found when He had created them that they were good and very good. 7 It is quite obvious that He who hath founded
1 St. Thomas, Sum. p. 1, q. 19, a. 4; St. Augustine, De Gen.
2 Ps. 134:6
3 Apoc. 4:11
4 Eph. 1:5
5 Wis. 11:25
6 Deut. 32:4
7 Gen. 1:31
the earth by wisdom and hath established the heavens by understanding 8 could not show less perfection in governing His
works than in creating them. So, as He is careful to remind us, if his Providence continues to have care of all things, 9 it is in measure and
number and weight, 10 it is with justice and mercy. 11 Neither can any man say to Him, Why dost thou so? 12 For if He assigns to His
creatures the end that He wills, and chooses the means which seem good to Him to lead them to it, the end He assigns them must be good
and wise, nor can He direct them towards their end other than by good and wise means. Therefore do not become foolish 13 the Apostle
tells us, but understand what the will of the Lord is, so that doing it you may receive the promise, 14 that is to say eternal happiness, for it
is written the world with its lust is passing away, but he who does the will of God abides forever. 15 God Controls All Events, Whether Good or Bad
Nothing happens in the universe without God willing and allowing it. This statement must be taken absolutely of everything
with the exception of sin. 'Nothing occurs by chance in the whole course of our lives' is the unanimous teaching of the Fathers and
Doctors of the Church, 'and God intervenes everywhere.' I am the Lord, He tells us Himself by the mouth of the prophet
Isaias, and there is none else. I form light and create darkness; I make peace and create evil. I, the Lord, do all these things. 16 It is I who
bring both death and life, I who inflict wounds and heal them, He said to Moses. 17 'The Lord killeth and maketh alive, it is written in
the Canticle of Anna, the mother of Samuel, He bringeth down to the tomb and He bringeth back again; the Lord maketh poor and maketh
8 Prov. 3:19
9 Wis. 12:13
10 id. 11:20
11 id. 12:15; 16:1
12 Eccles. 8:4
13 Eph. 5:7
14 Heb. 10:36
15 1 John 2:17
16 1s. 45:6-7
17 Deut. 32:39
rich, he humbleth and he exalteth. 18 Shall there be evil (disaster, affliction) in a city which the Lord hath not done? 19 asks the prophet
Amos: Good things and evil, life and death, poverty and riches are from God Solomon proclaims. 20 And so on in numerous other
passages of Scripture. Perhaps you will say that while this is true of certain necessary effects, like sickness, death, cold and heat, and other
accidents due to natural causes which have no liberty of action, the same cannot be said in the case of things that result from the free
will of man. For if, you will object, someone slanders me, robs me, strikes me, persecutes me, how can I attribute his conduct to the will
of God who far from wishing me to be treated in such a manner, expressly forbids it? So the blame, you will conclude, can only be laid
on the will of man, on his ignorance or malice. This is the defense behind which we try to shelter from God and excuse our lack of
courage and submission.
It is quite useless for us to try and take advantage of this way of reasoning as an excuse for not surrendering to Providence. God
Himself has refuted it and we must believe on His word that in events of this kind as in all others, nothing occurs except by His order and
permission.
Let us see what the Scriptures say. He wishes to punish the murder and adultery committed by David and He expresses Himself
as follows by the mouth of the prophet Nathan: Why therefore hast thou despised the word of the Lord, to do evil in my sight? Thou hast
killed Urias the Hittite with the sword, and hast taken his wife to be thy wife, and hast slain him with the sword of the children of
Ammon. Therefore the sword shall never depart from thy house, because thou hast despised me, and host taken the wife of Urias the
Hittite to be thy wife.
Thus saith the Lord: Behold, I will raise up evil against thee out of thy own house, and I will take thy wives before thy eyes and
give them to thy neighbor and he shall lie with thy wives in the sight of this sun. For thou didst it secretly, but I will do this thing in the
sight of all all Israel, and in the sight of the sun.
21 18 1 Kings 2:6-7
19 Amos 3:6
20 Ecclus. 11:14
21 2 Kings 12:9-12
Later when the Jews by their iniquities had grievously offended Him and provoked His wrath, He says: The Assyrian is the
rod and the staff of My anger, and My indignation is in his hands. I will send him to the deceitful nation, and I will give him charge
against the people of my wrath, to take away the spoils, and to lay hold on the prey, and to tread them down like the mire of the streets.
22 Could God more openly declare Himself to be responsible for the evils that Absalom caused his father and the King of Assyria the
Jews? It would be easy to find other instances but these are enough. Let us conclude then with St. Augustine: "All that happens to us in
this world against our will (whether due to men or to other causes) happens to us only by the will of God, by the disposal of Providence,
by His orders and under His guidance; and if from the frailty of our understanding we cannot grasp the reason for some event, let us
attribute it to divine Providence, show Him respect by accepting it from His hand, believe firmly that He does not send it us without
cause."
Replying to the murmurs and complaints of the Jews who attributed their captivity and sufferings to misfortune and causes
other than the will of God, the prophet Jeremias says to them: Who is he that hath commanded a thing to be done, when the Lord
commandeth it not? Do not both evil and good proceed out of the mouth of the Highest? Why doth a living man murmur, a man
suffering for his sins? Let us search our ways, and seek, and return to the Lord. Let us lift up our hearts with our hands to the Lord in the
heavens, saying, We have done wickedly and provoked thee to wrath; therefore thou art inexorable. 23 Are not these words clear enough?
We should take them to heart for our own good. Let us be careful to attribute everything to the will of God andbelieve that all is guided by
His paternal hand.
22 Is. 10:5-6
23 Lam. 3:37-42
How Can God Will or Allow Evil?
However, you will perhaps now say, there is sinfulness in all these actions. How then can God will them and take part in them if
He is all-holy and can have nothing in common with sin? God indeed is not and cannot be the author of sin. But it must
be remembered that in every sin there are two parts to be distinguished, one natural and the other moral. Thus, in the action of
the man you think you have a grievance against there is, for example, the movement of the arm that strikes you or the tongue
that offends you, and the movement of the will that turns aside from right reason and the law of God. The physical action of the arm or the
tongue, like all natural things, is quite good in itself and there is nothing to prevent its being produced with and by God's
cooperation. What is evil, what God could not cooperate with, is the sinful intention which the will of man contributes to the act.
When a man walks with a crippled leg the movement he makes comes both from the soul and the leg, but the defect which
causes him to walk badly is only in the leg. In the same way all evil actions must be attributed to God and to man in so far as they are
natural, physical acts, but they can be attributed only to the will of man in so far as they are sinful and blameworthy.
If then someone strikes you or slanders you, as the movement of the arm or tongue is in no way a sin, God can very well be, and
actually is, the author of it; for existence and movement in man not less than in any other creature proceed not from himself but from
God, who acts in him and by him. For in Him says St. Paul, we live and move and have our being. 24 As for the malice of the intention, it
proceeds entirely from man and in it alone is the sinfulness in which God has no share but which He yet permits in order not to interfere
with our freedom of will.
Moreover, when God cooperates with the person who attacks or robs you, He doubtless intends to deprive you of health or goods
because you are making a wrong use of them and they will be harmful to your soul. But He does not intend that the attacker or
robber should take them from you by a sin. That is the part of human malice, not God's design.
24 Acts 17:28
An example may make the matter clearer. A criminal is condemned to death by fair trial. But the executioner happens to be a
personal enemy of his, and instead of carrying out the judge's sentence as a duty, he does so in a spirit of hate and revenge.
Obviously the judge has no share in the executioner's sin. The will and intention of the judge is not that this sin should he committed,
but that justice should take its course and the criminal be punished. In the same way God has no share at all in the wickedness of
the man who strikes or robs you. That is something particular to the man himself. God, as we have said, wishes to make you see your own
faults, to humble you, deprive you of what you possess, in order to free you from vice and lead you to virtue; but this good and merciful
design, which He could carry out in numerous other ways without any sin being involved, has nothing in common with the sin of the
man who acts as His instrument. And in fact it is not this man's evil intention or sin that causes you to suffer, humiliates or impoverishes
you, but the loss of your well being, your good name or your possessions. The sin harms only the person who is guilty of it. This is
the way we ought to separate the good from the evil in events of this kind, and distinguish what God operates through men from what
men add to the act by their own will.
PRACTICAL EXAMPLES
St. Gregory sets the same truth before us in another light. A doctor, he says orders leeches to be applied. While these small
creatures are drawing blood from the patient their only aim is to gorge themselves and suck up as much of it as they can. The doctor's
only intention is to have the impure blood drawn from the patient and to cure him in this manner. There is therefore no relation
between the insatiable greed of the leeches and the intelligent purpose of the doctor in using them. The patient himself does not
protest at their use. He does not regard the leeches as evildoers.
Rather he tries to overcome the repugnance the sight of their ugliness causes and help them in their action, in the knowledge that
the doctor has judged it useful for his health. God makes use of men as the doctor does of leeches. Neither should we then stop to
consider the evilness of those to whom God gives power to act on us or be grieved at their wicked intentions, and we should keep
ourselves from feelings of aversion towards them. Whatever their particular views may be, in regard to us they are only instruments of
well being, guided by the hand of an all-good, all-wise, all-powerful God who will allow them to act on us only in so far as is of use to us.
It is in our interest to welcome instead of trying to repel their assaults, as in very truth they come from God. And it is the same with
all creatures of whatever kind. Not one of them could act upon us unless the power were given it from above.
This truth has always been familiar to the minds of those truly enlightened by God. We have a celebrated example in Job. He
loses his children and his possessions; he falls from the height of fortune to the depths of poverty. And he says The Lord gave and the
Lord hath taken away. As it hath pleased the Lord, so is it done. Blessed be the name of the Lord. 25 "Note" observes St. Augustine "Job
does not say 'The Lord gave and the devil hath taken away' but says, wise that he is, 'The Lord gave me my children and my possessions,
and it is He who has taken them away; it has been done as it has pleased the Lord."
The example of Joseph is no less instructive. His brothers had old him into slavery from malice and for a wicked purpose, and
nevertheless the holy patriarch insists on attributing all to God's providence. God sent me, he says, before you into Egypt 26 to save
life. . . . God sent me before you to preserve a remnant for you in the land, and to deliver you in striking way. Not you but God sent me
here, and made me a father to Pharaoh, lord of all his house, and ruler over the land of Egypt. Let us now listen to Our Savior himself who
came down from heaven to teach us by His word and example. In an excess of zeal Peter tries to turn Him aside from His purpose of submitting to His
passion and prevent the soldiers laying their hands on Him. But Jesus said to him: Shall I not drink the cup that the Father has given me? 27
In fact He attributed the suffering and ignominy of His passion not to the Jews who accused him, not to Judas who betrayed Him, nor to
Pilate who condemned Him, nor to the soldiers who ill-treated and
25 Job 1:21
26 Gen. 45:5-8
27 John 18:11
crucified Him, nor to the devil who incited them all, though they were the immediate causes of His sufferings, but to God, and to God
not considered as a strict judge but as a loving and beloved Father. Let us never then attribute our losses, our disappointments,
our afflictions, our humiliations to the devil or to men, but to God as their real source. "To act otherwise" says St. Dorothy, "would be to
do the same as a dog who vents his anger on the stone instead of putting the blame on the hand that threw it at him." So let us be
careful not to say 'So-and-so is the cause of my misfortune.' Your misfortunes are the work not of this or that person but of God. And
what should give you reassurance is that God, the sovereign good, is guided in all His actions by His most profound wisdom for holy and
supernatural purposes.
God Does Everything With Supreme Wisdom All wisdom comes from the Lord God we find in the Book of Ecclesiasticus, and with him
it remains forever, and is before all time . . . and he has poured her forth upon all his works. 28 How manifold are your works, O Lord!
exclaims the Psalmist, In wisdom thou hast wrought them all. 29 It could not be otherwise, for God, being infinite wisdom and acting by
Himself, cannot act except in an infinitely wise manner.
For this reason many of the Doctors of the Church hold that, having regard to the circumstances, His works are so perfect that
they could not be more so, and so good that they could not be better. 'We ought then' says St. Basil, 'to ponder well on this thought, that
we are the work of a good Workman, and that He dispenses and distributes to us all things great and small with the wisest
providence, so that there is nothing had, nothing that could even be conceived better.' The works of the Lord are great the Psalmist again
says, exquisite in all their delights. 30 His wisdom is especially shown in the right proportion between the means He employs and the end
He has in view. She reaches from end to end mightily and governs all things well. 31 She (Wisdom) governs men with admirable order, she
leads them to their happiness mightily but without violence or constraint, with sweetness and not only with sweetness, but still
more with circumspection.
But though you have might at your disposal, says the Sage,you judge with clemency, and with much lenience you govern us. 32
You are endowed with an infinite strength that nothing can resist but with us you do not use the absolute power of your sovereign
authority. You treat us with extreme condescension and adapting yourself to the weakness of nature, design to place each one of us in
the best and most suitable situation for working out our salvation. You dispose of us with great favor as persons who at your living
image and of noble origin and who, because of their condition, are
28 Eccles. 1:1,8
29 Ps. 103:24
30 Ps. 110:2
31 Wis. 8:1
32 Wis. 12:18
not to be ordered in the voice of a master as if they were slaves, but with care and consideration. You treat us with the same
circumspection as one handles a vase of precious crystal or fragile pottery for fear of breaking it. When it is necessary for our good for
you to afflict us or send us some illness or make us suffer some loss or pain, you always do so with a certain respect and a kind of
deference. As a surgeon who has to operate on a person of importance takes extra care to cause him as little suffering as
possible and only what is strictly necessary for his recovery, or as a father unwillingly punishes a son he loves dearly only because he is
obliged to do so for his son's good, so God treats us as noble beings for whom He has the highest regard, or as beloved children whom he
chastises because he loves them. 33 Trials and Punishments Are Blessings From God Looking, St. Paul tells us, towards the author and finisher of
faith, Jesus (the only begotten and beloved Son in whom the Father is well pleased) .... Consider then Him Who endured such opposition
from sinners against Himself, so that you may not grow weary and lose heart. For you have not yet resisted unto blood (as He did) in the
struggle with sin, and you have forgotten the exhortation that is addressed to you as sons, saying, My son, neglect not the discipline of
the Lord, neither be thou weary when thou art rebuked by Him. For whom the Lord loves He chastises, and He scourges every son whom
He receives. Continue under discipline, for God deals with you as with sons; for what son is there whom his father does not correct? 34
In short, the purpose for which God acts is a high and holy one, His own glory and the good of His creatures. Infinitely good -- Goodness
itself -- He seeks to make them all perfect by drawing them towards Him and making them sharers in His divinity as far as they are
capable. But because of the close ties He has established with us by the union of our nature with His in the person of his Son, we in a still
more special manner are the object of His benevolence and tender care. A glove is not more fitted to a hand or a sword to a scabbard
than what He does and ordains in us and for us is suited to our
33 Apoc. 3:19
34 Heb. 12:2-7
strength and capabilities, so that everything may serve to our advantage and perfection if we but cooperate with the designs of his
providence. Our Trials Are Never Greater Than Our Strength to Bear Them Do not let ourselves be troubled when we are sometimes
beset by adversity, for we know that it is meant for our spiritual welfare and carefully proportioned to our needs, and that a limit has
been set to it by the wisdom of the same God who has set a bound to the ocean. Sometimes it might seem as if the sea in its fury would
overflow and flood the land, but it respects the limits of its shore and its waves break upon the yielding sand. There is no tribulation or
temptation whose limits God has not appointed so as to serve not for our destruction but for our salvation. God is faithful says the Apostle,
and will not permit you to be tempted (or afflicted) beyond your strength, 35 but it is necessary for you to be so, since through many
tribulations we must enter the kingdom of God 36 in the steps of our Redeemer who said of Himself, Did not the Christ have to suffer all
these things before entering into His glory? 37 If you refused to accept these tribulations you would be acting against your best
interests. You are like a block of marble in the hands of the sculptor. The sculptor must chip, hew and smooth it to make it into a statue
that is a work of art. God wishes to make us the living image of Himself. All we need to think of is to keep still in His hands while He
works on us, and we can rest assured that the chisel will never strike the slightest blow that is not needed for His purposes and our
sanctification; for, as St. Paul says, the will of God is your sanctification. 38
35 1 Cor. 10:13
36 Acts. 14:21
37 Luke 24:26
38 I Thessalonians 4:3
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| French Traditioanl Catholic Author Condemned for Writing against Freemasonry |
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Posted by: Elizabeth - 02-13-2021, 05:45 PM - Forum: Anti-Catholic Violence
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The following was sent in an email to those who are subscribed to the Éditions St. Rémi, which is a French publishing company that sells and prints Catholic books.
The books from this author in French include (I translated the titles), under the Judaism-Freemasonry category: Synthesis of the World Revolutionary Movement; A MASONIC LODGE LEADS THE VATICAN; FREEMASONRY: 300 YEARS OF IMPOSTURE; and CONSPIRACY AGAINST GOD.
His books are available at the following link: https://saint-remi.fr/fr/35-livres?q=Fil...ETTE+Johan
I also included the French PDF that Éditions St. Rémi made themselves.
Johan LIVERNETTE, the author whose books we publish, which denounce the action of Freemasonry against the Catholic Church, was incarcerated.
We communicate below the message he succeeded in spreading on his Facebook page, thanks to one of his friends, despite his incarceration at the prison of La Farlède in Toulon.
We would like to express our support for this courageous Catholic author who finds himself behind bars because of a machiavelic plot, according to the first-hand accounts we have received. This writer is disturbing; with his writings and his communications on the Internet, he denounces the action of the counter-church and brings many people back to the Catholic Faith. "Blessed are ye when they shall revile you, and persecute you, and speak all that is evil against you, untruly, for my sake: Be glad and rejoice, for your reward is very great in heaven. For so they persecuted the prophets that were before you." (Mt., V, 10-12)
A convert himself for about ten years, he has not had the grace of a Catholic education since childhood in a traditional Catholic family. He has had to redo his education and religious instruction, despite the very hostile family and relational environment in which he lives.
We invite you to support him by your prayers, by your visits or letters to him, a work of mercy, and by obtaining his books.
Bruno Saglio
Director of Éditions Saint-Remi
"Rights and Standing,
18 months in prison: this is the very heavy penalty that was imposed on me on February 5th at the criminal court of Toulon. My two rosaries per day in police custody added to the "Ave Maria" before the judgment were not enough. This news must surprise those who were not aware that I have been in the crosshairs of justice for several weeks. In a short period of time, I have indeed lived through hard trials during two police custody periods of 48 hours each (or 96 hours). For the time being, I will refrain from expressing myself too much on this absolutely scandalous condemnation in view of the facts (violence). For there was nothing at all about the events of December 5, and all those present know this very well. Nothing at all. Nothing at all. Cinema. In one sentence: a simulated aggression leading to a serious conviction. My personality and my politico-religious ideas were obviously very displeasing to the public prosecutor's office. But this is by no means a fact worthy of imprisonment. To be imprisoned when you have done wrong is already difficult from a human point of view. To be incarcerated for an injustice is terrible. The truth was the biggest loser in my judgment of February 5th.
This affair, which has marked me for life, will be the subject of a book (a "novel") in which I will write everything I have lived through, in detail, these last few weeks: the sequence of events, the anecdotes (funny and often dramatic), the encounters, the suffering, and above all: the betrayals. The immense betrayal of the mother of my children. Betrayal also of one of my relatives who signed his testimony without having read it!
On Friday, February 5th, with my lawyer, the valiant and exemplary Philip Fitzgerald, we lost a battle. But we fought with dignity, heart and righteousness, in a spirit of truth and honesty. And that is what matters. We were defeated, of course, but we stood tall and upright, despite the injustice. On February 4th and 5th, before this shameful condemnation, I lived strong moments, humanly and emotionally, with my lawyer and a father from Marseilles with whom I made friends in the jails.
Here people don't understand why I'm here; here people suffer in silence, and in some cases noisily. It's in these difficult moments when we see who is, where I will see who really loves me sincerely. Today I am a destroyed man. I have to admit it. But tomorrow will be another day. By my example on a daily basis, I hope to be able to celebrate Christmas 2021 with my children. This is my primary goal.
I invite you to write to me as often as possible at this address:
Toulon Penitentiary Center - la Farlède
CS 10543
Livernette Johan
Numéro d'écrou: 25532
83041 Toulon cedex 9
I will be happy to answer you. Our exchanges will be valuable and certainly fruitful.
For those who want to support me by buying my books, thank you for ordering them from Saint-Rémi Editions.
May the Lord Jesus be with you and with your spirit."
Johan Livernette
Johan-LIVERNETTE-incarcere.pdf (Size: 453.89 KB / Downloads: 2)
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| St. Alphonsus di Liguori: The Importance of Silence |
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Posted by: Stone - 02-13-2021, 11:32 AM - Forum: The Saints
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THE IMPORTANCE OF SILENCE
[Although written for religious sisters the benefit for those living in the world cannot be overstated.]
![[Image: ?u=https%3A%2F%2Fi.pinimg.com%2Foriginal...f=1&nofb=1]](https://external-content.duckduckgo.com/iu/?u=https%3A%2F%2Fi.pinimg.com%2Foriginals%2F81%2Ff9%2F81%2F81f981f2ccfe8546b665b980a83aef8a.jpg&f=1&nofb=1)
CHAPTER XVI - SILENCE, SOLITUDE, AND THE PRESENCE OF GOD
[Only the section on Silence is here presented]
CASSIAN says: 'The religious prays little who prays only when she is on her knees in the choir or in the cell. (1) To
fulfil the obligations of her state, a religious should keep her soul continually united with God; but to maintain this constant union, continual prayer is necessary. There are three means of acquiring the habit of continual prayer; namely, silence, solitude,and the presence of God. These were the means that the angel suggested to St. Arsenius when he said: 'If you wish to be saved, fly into solitude, observe silence, and repose in God by always keeping yourself in his presence. (2) We shall speak of each of these means separately.
I. Silence.
In the first place, silence is a great means of acquiring the spirit of prayer, and of disposing the soul to converse continually with God. We rarely find a spiritual soul that speaks much. All souls of prayer are lovers of silence that is called the guardian of innocence, the shield against temptations, and the fountain of prayer. For by silence devotion is preserved, and in silence good thoughts spring up in the soul. St. Bernard says: 'Silence and the absence of noise in a certain manner force the soul to think of God and of eternal goods. (3) Hence, the saints fled to the mountains, to caves, and to deserts, in order to find this silence, and escape the tumults of the world, in which, as was said to Elias, God is not found. (3 Kings, xix. 11) Theodosius the monk observed silence for thirty-five years. St. John the Silent, who gave up his bishopric and became a monk, observed silence for forty-seven years before his death; and all the saints, even they who were not solitaries, have been lovers of silence. Oh, how great the blessings that silence brings to the soul! The prophet says that silence shall cultivate justice in the soul; (Isaias, xxxii. 17) for, on the one hand, it saves us from a multitude of sins by destroying the root of disputes, of detractions, of resentments, and of curiosity; and on the other, it makes us acquire many virtues. How well does the nun practise humility who when others speak listens with modesty and in silence! How well does she practise mortification by not yielding to her inclination or desire to tell a certain anecdote, or to use a witty expression suggested by the conversation! How well does she practise meekness by remaining silent when unjustly censured or offended! Hence the same holy prophet said: In silence and in hope shall be your strength. (Isaias xxx. 15) Your strength shall be in silence and in hope; for by silence we shun the occasions of sin, and by hope we obtain the divine aid to lead a holy life.
But, on the other hand, immense evils flow from speaking too much. In the first place, as devotion is preserved by silence, so it is lost by a multitude of words. However recollected the soul may have been in prayer, if it afterwards indulge in long discourses it will find the mind as distracted and dissipated as if it had not made meditation. Besides, the Holy Ghost tells us that in speaking too much we shall not fail to commit some fault. In the multitude of words they shall not want sin. (Prov, x. 19) While they speak and prolong conversation without necessity, certain persons think that they are not guilty of any defect; but if they carefully examine themselves they will find some fault against modesty, of detraction, of curiosity, or at least of superfluous words. St. Mary Magdalene Pazzi used to say that a religious should speak only through necessity. For religious are bound in a special manner to give an account of idle words, for which, according to our Saviour, all men shall have to render account. But I say unto you, that every idle word that men shall speak, they shall account for it in the day of judgment. (Matt, xii. 36)
I have used the words to some defect; but when we speak too much we shall find that we have committed a thousand faults. St. James has called the tongue a universal evil: The tongue is . . . a world of iniquity. (James iii.6) For, as a learned author remarks, the greater number of sins arise from speaking or from listening to others. Alas! how many nuns shall we see condemned on the day of judgment, on account of having had but little regard for silence! And what is most to be deplored is, that the religious that dissipates her mind by intercourse with creatures, and by too much speaking, will never be able to see her defects, and thus she will go from bad to worse. A man full of tongue shall not be established in the earth. (Ps, xxxix. 12) The man that speaks too much shall walk without a guide, and therefore he shall fall into a thousand mistakes without the hope of ever perceiving them. Such a religious appears as if unable to live without speaking continually from morning till evening. She wishes to know what happens in the monastery and in the world; she goes about asking questions from all the others, and afterwards says, What evil am I doing? I answer you, dearly beloved sister, put an end to idle talk; endeavor to recollect yourself a little and you will see how many defects you have committed by the multitude of your words.
St. Joseph Calasanctius used to say 'that a dissipated religious is a source of joy to the devil. And justly, for by her dissipation she not only does not attend to her own sanctification, but is also an obstacle to the advancement of others, by going about the monastery in search of some one to converse with her, by speaking in a loud voice in every place, and by a want of reverence, even in the choir and sacristy. St. Ambrose relates that a certain priest, while at prayer, was disturbed by the cries of a multitude of frogs: he commanded them to be silent, and they instantly obeyed. The holy Doctor then took occasion to say: 'Shall senseless animals, then, be silent through respect for prayer, and shall men not be silent? (5) And I add, will religious refuse to practise silence, after having entered the monastery in order to become saints, to observe their Rule, and to maintain holy recollection; or will they perform the office of the devil, by disturbing their sisters who wish to pray, and to be recollected with God? A certain author justly calls such talkative nuns 'the home devils of monasteries, who do great injury to the Community.
According to St. Ignatius of Loyola, to know if there is fervor in a convent, it is enough to ascertain whether silence is observed or violated. A monastery in which the sisters speak continually is an image of hell; for where there is not silence there must be continual disputes, detractions, complaints, particular friendships, and factions. But, on the other hand, a monastery in which the religious love silence is an image of paradise: it excites devotion not only in all who live in it, but also in those who live in the world. It is related by Father Perez, of the Order of Discalced Carmelites, that while a secular he entered one day into a house of the Order, and was so edified and filled with devotion by the silence of the brethren, that he renounced the world and remained in the convent. Father Natalis, of the Society of Jesus, used to say, that to reform a religious house it is enough to establish in it the observance of silence. Because each of the religious would then practise recollection, and would attend to his own advancement. Hence, also, Gerson says that the holy founders of religious Orders have prescribed and earnestly recommended silence to their religious, because they knew how important its observance is for the maintenance of fervor. In his rules for nuns, St. Basil insists, not once, but frequently, on silence. St. Benedict commanded his monks to endeavor to observe continual silence. (6)
And experience shows that in the monastery in which silence is observed, discipline is maintained; and on the other hand, where silence is neglected, but little fervor is found. Hence few religious become saints, because few love silence. In many monasteries the rule of silence is prescribed by the written rules, and is strongly recommended; but some of the religious appear not to know what silence is, and therefore they unhappily live in dissipation, without fervor, and always in trouble. But, dear sister, do not imagine that the negligence of others will excuse or exempt you from the rule of silence. Blessed Clare of Montefalco used to say that in the time of silence it is difficult to speak without committing a fault.
Some one may excuse herself, saying, that it is sometimes necessary to speak in order to get rid of melancholy; but how can the violation of silence free a religious from melancholy? Let us be persuaded that all the creatures on earth or in heaven cannot console us in our afflictions. God alone is the author of consolation; but will he console us at the very time we offend him? But when there is any necessity for speaking in the time of silence, at least ask permission. Another religious does not seek occasions to speak, but as often as they are presented she allows herself to be led into breaches of silence by others who wish to speak. But her condescension will certainly not excuse her from the fault. It is necessary, then, to do violence to yourself, and to go away, or to remain silent, and sometimes by putting the finger on the mouth to make a sign that it is a time of silence.
And even out of the hours of silence endeavor to practise it as much as possible if you wish to keep yourself recollected with God and free from imperfections; for there is no sin more easily committed than sins of tongue. He, says Solomon, that keepeth his mouth keepeth his soul. (Prov, xiii. 3) And St. James says that he who sins not with the tongue is a perfect man: If any man offend not in word, the same is a perfect man. (James, iii. 2) Hence it is the same thing to be a silent religious and a holy religious; for by observing silence she will be punctual to the rules, she will be devoted to prayer, to spiritual reading, and to her visits to the Holy Sacrament. Oh, how dear to God does the religious render herself who loves silence! (7) By silence we learn to consider well what we shall afterwards say. But for a religious who wishes to become a saint, what is the time for silence and the time for speaking? The hours of silence for her are all the hours in which there is no necessity for speaking. The time for speaking is when necessity or charity obliges her to speak. Behold the excellent rule of St. John Chrysostom: 'Then only should we speak when it is more useful to speak than to be silent. (8) Hence the saint gives the following advice: 'Either remain silent, or say what is more profitable than silence. (9) Oh! happy he who at death can say what the monk Pambo said: 'That he did not remember to have ever uttered a word which he was sorry for having spoken. (10) St. Arsenius used to say that he often repented of having spoken, but never of having remained silent. (11) St. Ephrem gave this excellent lesson to religious: 'Speak a great deal with God, and little with men. (12) St. Mary Magdalene de Pazzi used to say the same: 'The true servant of Jesus Christ bears all things; she labors much, and speaks little.
From all that has been said, every religious that wishes to live in union with God may see with what care she should shun the parlor. As the air that is breathed in the choir or in the cell is the most salubrious for religious, so the air of the grates is for them the most pestiferous. And what is the parlor but what St. Mary Magdalene de Pazzi called it, a place of distractions, inquietudes, and of temptations. The Venerable Sister Mary Villani one day compelled the devil, on the part of God, to tell in what part of the monastery he gained most. The tempter answered: I gain in the choir, in the refectory, and in the dormitory: in these places I partly gain, and partly lose. But in the parlor gain all, for the whole place is mine, Hence the Venerable Sister Philippa Cerrina had reason to call the parlor an infected place, in which the contagion of sin is easily caught. St. Bernardine of Sienna relates that a religious in consequence of having heard in the parlor an improper word miserably fell into a grievous sin. Truly happy was the holy virgin St. Fabronia, who afterwards gave her life for the faith at the age of nineteen; she would never allow herself to be seen at the grate by any secular, male or female. St. Teresa appeared after death to one of her spiritual children, and said to her: The religious that wishes to be a great friend of God must be an enemy of the grate.
Would to God that in all monasteries there were grates of perforated iron such as we find in some observant convents! A certain author relates that the Superior of a monastery procured a narrow grate; but the devil, through rage, first bent it, and afterwards sent it rolling through the house. The good Superior placed it, crooked as it was, in the parlor to give the nuns to understand that as the grate was hateful to hell so it was pleasing to God. Oh! what an awful account will the abbess have to give to God who introduces open grates, or who neglects to make the companions attend. In one of her letters St. Teresa wrote this great sentence: 'The grates when shut are the gates of heaven; and when open they are the gates of danger (she did not wish to say hell). And she added: 'A monastery of nuns in which there is liberty serves to conduct them to hell rather than to cure their weakness.
What rapid progress in divine love does the religious make who resolves never to go to the grate! When you, dear sister, go to the parlor, be careful at least to conduct yourself like a religious. In your intercourse with seculars you should not only guard with great care against all affectionate expressions, but should also be very grave and reserved in the parlor. St. Mary Magdalene de Pazzi wished her nuns to be 'like the wild deer-these are her very words. And the Venerable Sister Hyacinth Marescotti used to say: 'The courtesy of nuns consists in being discourteous by cutting short all long discourses in the parlor. This applies, ordinarily speaking, to long discourses even with spiritual persons.
Mother Anne of Jesus, a Discalced Carmelite, said: 'A nun acquires more fervor in the choir or in the cell than by the longest conferences in the parlor. Show all respect to directors, but you should treat with them only through necessity; despatch your business with them in a few words.
Should you ever happen to hear in the parlor an indecent word, go away immediately; or, at least, cast down your eyes, and change the discourse, or give no answer. In a monastery of the Venerable Sister Seraphina de Carpi two women began to speak about a certain marriage: the attendant at the turn heard the voice of Sister Seraphina (who was dead) saying, 'Chase away, chase away these women. And whenever it is in your power, endeavor to change all discourses that savor of the world. St. Frances of Rome received a buffet from an angel because she did not change the conversation of certain ladies who spoke of worldly vanities. You should be still more careful to observe silence with your sisters in the monastery: for the occasion of breaking silence with them is more continual. Hence it is necessary to mortify curiosity. The Abbot John used to say: 'Let him who wishes to restrain the tongue shut his ears by mortifying the curiosity of hearing news. It is also necessary to avoid the conversation of any religious who speaks frequently. It is, moreover, well to fix some time each day during which you will observe silence, remaining alone in your cell or in some solitary place in order to avoid the occasions of speaking.Whenever you have to speak, be careful, in conformity with the advice of the Holy Ghost, Make a balance for thy words, (Ecclus, xxviii. 29) to examine what you ought to say. Make a balance for your words that you may weigh them before you give expression to them. Hence St. Bernard says that 'before your words come to the tongue, let them pass twice under the file of examination, (13) that you may suppress what you should not utter. The same was said by St. Francis de Sales in other words, namely, that to speak without sin every one should keep a lock on his lips, that in opening his mouth to speak he might reflect well on what he wishes to say.
Before speaking you should consider'1. Whether what you intend to say can injure charity, modesty, or exact observance.
2. Examine the motive that impels you to speak; for it sometimes happens that what a person says is good, but her intention is bad; she speaks either to appear spiritual, or to acquire a character for talent.
3. Examine to whom you speak, whether to your Superiors, to companions, or to inferiors: whether in the presence of seculars, or of the postulants, who may perhaps be scandalized at what you say.
4. At recreation, which is the proper time for unbending the mind, speak when the others are silent, but endeavor as often as you can to speak on something that has reference to God. 'Let us speak of the Lord Jesus, says St. Ambrose, 'let us always speak of him. (15) And what other enjoyment should a religious seek than to speak of her most amiable Spouse? He who has an ardent love for another, appears unable to speak of anything but of him. They who speak little of Jesus Christ, show that they have but little love for Jesus Christ. On the other hand, it often happens that good religious, after speaking on divine love, feel more fervor than after mental prayer. At the conversations of the servants of God, says St. Teresa, Jesus Christ is always present. Of this, Father Gisolfo, of the Congregation of the 'Pious Workers, relates a memorable example, in the life of the Venerable Father Anthony de Collelis. He says that Father Constantine Rossi, the Master of novices, saw one day two of his young disciples, F. D. Anthony Torres, and F. D. Philip Orilia, conversing together, and with them a young man of most beautiful aspect. The Master of novices was surprised that two novices, whom he regarded as most exemplary, should speak to a stranger without permission: he therefore asked who was the young man whom he had seen conversing with them. They said there was no one conversing with them. But he afterwards learned that they were speaking of Jesus Christ, and understood that the person whom he saw in their company was our divine Saviour.
Except in the hours of recreation, and other extraordinary occasions, such as in attending the sick or in consoling a sister in tribulation, it is always better to be silent. A religious of the Order of St. Teresa, as we find in the Teresian Chronicles, said that it is better to speak with God than to speak of God. But when obedience or charity obliges you to speak, or to have intercourse with creatures, you must always endeavor to find intervals, for at least repairing the losses caused by the distractions attendant on these external occupations; stealing at least as many little moments as possible to recollect yourself with God; thus following the counsel of the Holy Ghost: Let not the part of a good gift overpass thee. (Ecclus, xiv. 14) Do not allow that particle of time to pass away: give it to God, if you can have no more to give him during the day. But whenever you can abridge the conversation, abridge it under some pretext. A good religious seeks not pretexts, as some do, to prolong conversation, but endeavors to find out some means of shortening it. Let us remember that time is given us not to be spent unprofitably, but to be employed for God, and in acquiring merits for eternity. St. Bernardine of Sienna used to say that a moment of time is of as much value as God, because in each moment we can gain his friendship, or greater degrees of grace.
Prayer.
O my God, may the patience with which Thou hast borne me be forever blessed.
Thou hast given me time to love Thee, and I have spent it in offending and displeasing Thee.
Were I now to die, with what heartfelt pain should I end my life, at the thought of having spent so many years in the
world, and of having done nothing.
Lord, I thank Thee for still giving me time to repair my negligence, and so many lost years.
O my Jesus! through the merits of Thy Passion assist me.
I do not wish to live any longer for myself, but only for Thee, and for Thy love.
I know not how much of life remains, whether it is long or short; but were it a hundred or a thousand years, I wish to spend them all in loving and pleasing Thee.
I love Thee, O my Sovereign Good, and I hope to love Thee for eternity.
I do not wish to be ever again ungrateful to Thee.
I will no longer resist Thy love, which has so long called me to be entirely Thine.
Shall I wait till Thou abandon me, and call me no more?
Mary, my mother, assist me, pray for me, and obtain for me perseverance in my resolution to be faithful to God.
Notes referenced in the text:
1 'Perparum orat, quisquis, illo tantum tempore quo genua flectuntur, orare consuevit.-Collat. 10, c. 14
2 'Si vis salvus esse, fuge, tace et quiesce.-Vit. Patr. l. 3, n. 190.
3 'Silentium, et a strepitu quies, cogit coelestia meditari.-Epist. 78
4 'Cave a multiloquio; hoc enim sanctas cogitations extinguit.-Doctr. 24
5 'Silent igitur paludes; hominess non silebunt?-De Virgin. l. 3
6 'Omni tempore silentio debent studere monachi.-Reg. c. 42
7 'Per silentium disci, quod postea proferatur.
8 'Tunc solum loquendum est, quando plus proficit quam silentium.-In Ps. cxl
9 'Aut tace, aut dic meliora silentio.
10 Prac. of perf. p. 2, tr. 2, ch. 8
11 'Me saepe poenituit dixisse, nunquam tacuisse.-Surius, 19 Jul
12 'Cum Deo, multis; cum hominibus, paucis loquere.-Encom. in Ps.
13 'Bis ad limam veniant verba, quam semel ad linguam.-Punct. perf. 7
14 Spec. disc. p. I, c. 31
15 'Loquamur Dominum Jesum, ipsum semper loquamur.-In Ps. xxxvi.
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| Man dies 25 minutes after receiving vaccination at Javits Center (NY) |
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Posted by: Stone - 02-13-2021, 09:57 AM - Forum: COVID Vaccines
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Man dies after receiving vaccination at Javits Center; doctor says initial indications show no allergic reaction
News 12 Staff | Feb 09, 2021
The New York state Department of Health reported that a man collapsed and died Sunday morning about 25 minutes after receiving the coronavirus vaccine at the Javits Center.
However, the health commissioner says initial indications are that the man, whose name has not yet been released, did not have an allergic reaction.
"The benefits of this vaccine far outweigh any potential risks,” said Dr. Rossi Hassad, “He was observed for 15 minutes following the vaccine, which is the required protocol."
Hassad added that the most severe reactions will occur in that time period.
Health officials say the man who died exhibited no adverse reactions during observation.
"Their death might be linked to the vaccine because of the proximity, but it’s a coincidence - it’s not a causal connection,” said Hassad.
Dr. Hassad said he understands some people may be concerned but says there are no known negative outcomes and those allergic reactions to the vaccine are rare.
"This is a very safe and very effective vaccine...Vaccines do not kill, not having vaccines kill," said Hassad.
He says that if anyone has concerns, they should consult with their doctor--especially if they’ve had severe allergic reactions to vaccines in the past.
He says some people may experience a fever, aches and headaches afterward, which is completely normal.
"Mild vaccine reactions you get which are indicators that your immune system is responding appropriately,” said Hassad.
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| CDC recommends double-masking for more protection against COVID-19 |
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Posted by: Stone - 02-13-2021, 09:41 AM - Forum: Pandemic 2020 [Secular]
- Replies (1)
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CDC recommends double-masking for more protection against COVID-19
NY Post | February 10, 2021
The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention is recommending that everyone wear two face coverings — after a new study found that doubling up can improve mask performance against COVID-19 by about 50 percent.
Wearing a cloth covering over a medical procedure mask or disposable mask significantly helps reduce exposure to the deadly bug, the CDC study found.
The agency said it studied two ways of improving the use of medical masks — “fitting a cloth mask over a medical procedure mask, and knotting the ear loops of a medical procedure mask and then tucking in and flattening the extra material close to the face.”
It said that “each modification substantially improved source control and reduced wearer exposure.”
In lab tests with dummies, exposure to potentially infectious aerosols decreased by about 95 percent when they both wore tight-fitting masks, according to the study.
Other effective options to improve mask use include using a mask fitter or a nylon covering, the CDC said.
It recommends choosing a mask with a nose wire — a metal strip along the top that prevents air from leaking. The wire should be molded over the nose for a snug fit, which can be checked by cupping your hands around the outside edges of the mask.
Users should make sure no air is escaping from the area under their eyes or from the sides of the mask, the agency said.
The CDC also recommends adding layers of material, including using a cloth mask that has several layers of fabric.
Meanwhile, the agency warns against combining two disposable masks, which are not designed to fit tightly, or combining a KN95 mask with any other covering.
“What we want to do is now help consumers make mask-wearing work better for them,” Dr. John Brooks, the CDC’s chief medical officer for COVID-19 response, who co-authored the new study, told Business Insider.
“There’ve been a number of different ways, simple ways, low-tech ways, that people can improve the performance of their mask,” he added. “More layers helps, better fit is critical.”
In the study, the researchers put masks on two dummy heads — one that coughed and breathed into the air and another head about six feet away from the first.
They measured how much of the would-be infectious particles the first dummy spewed made it over to the second head.
Both cloth and surgical masks alone did “OK” at filtering particles out of the air, Brooks said.
A surgical mask alone on the cougher blocked about 42 percent of the particles from the healthy head, while the cloth one blocked more than 44 percent, the study found.
But when they put a cloth mask over a surgical mask, they found the double masking dramatically improved the performance of both masks, blocking 92.5 percent of the cough particles.
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| St. Gregory the Great: Pastoral Rule |
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Posted by: Stone - 02-13-2021, 09:19 AM - Forum: Fathers of the Church
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Taken from the Catholic Encyclopedia
Pastoral Rule
by Pope St. Gregory the Great
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Book I
Preface
The title, Liber Regulæ Pastoralis, is the one adopted by the Benedictine Edition from several ancient mss ., being Gregory's own designation of his work when he sent it to his friend, Leander of Seville;— Ut librum Regulæ Pastoralis, quem in episcopatus mei exordio scripsi...sanctitati tuæ transmitterem (Epp. Lib. v., Ep. 49). The previously more usual one, Liber Pastoralis Curæ, may have been taken from the opening words of the book itself, Pastoralis curæ me pondera fugere, etc. The book was issued (as appears from the passage above quoted in the Epistle to Leander) at the commencement of Gregory's episcopacy, and (as appears from its opening words) addressed to John, bishop of Ravenna, in reply to a letter received from him. But, though put into form for a special purpose on this occasion, it must have been the issue of long previous thought, as is further evident from the fact that in his Magna Moralia, or Commentary on the Book of Job, begun and in a great measure written during his residence in Constantinople, he had already sketched the plan of such a treatise, and expressed the hope of some day putting it into form. For we there find the prologue to the third book of the Regula already written, together with most of the headings contained in the first chapter of that book, followed by the words, And indeed we ought to have denoted particularly what should be the order of admonition with respect to each of these points; but fear of prolixity deters us. Yet, with God's help, we hope to complete this task in another work, should some little time of this laborious life still remain to us (Moral. Lib. xxx. c. 12 and 13).
The book appears to have been estimated as it deserved during the writer's life. It was sent by him, as we have seen, to Leander of Seville, apparently at the request of the latter, for the benefit of the Church in Spain; and there will be found among the Epistles one addressed to Gregory from Licinianus, a learned bishop of Carthagena in that country, in which it is highly praised, though a fear is expressed lest the standard required in it of fitness for the episcopal office might prove too high for ordinary attainment (Epp. Lib. II., Ep. 54). The Emperor Maurice, having requested and obtained a copy of it from Anatolius, Gregory's deacon at Constantinople, had it translated into Greek by Anastasius the patriarch of Antioch, who himself highly approved of it (Epp. Lib. XII., Ep. 24). It appears to have been taken to England by the Monk Augustine. This is asserted by Alfred the Great, who, nearly three hundred years afterwards, with the assistance of his divines, made a translation, or rather paraphrase, of it in the West Saxon tongue, intending, as he says, to send a copy to every bishop in his Kingdom.
Previously to this, there is evidence of the high repute in which the book was held in Gaul. In a series of councils held by command of Charlemagne, a.d. 813 — viz. at Mayence, Rheims, Tours, and Châlon-sur-Seine — the study of it was specially enjoined on all bishops, together with the New Testament Scriptures and the Canons of the Fathers. Similarly at a Council held at Aix-la-Chapelle, a.d. 836. Further, it appears from a letter of Hincmar , Archbishop of Rheims (a.d. 845-882), that a copy of it together with the Book of Canons was given into the hands of bishops before the altar at their consecration, and that they were admonished to frame their lives accordingly.
The work is well worthy of its old repute, being the best of its kind, and profitable for all ages. Two similar works had preceded it. First, that of Gregory Nazianzen (c. a.d. 362), known as his second oration, and called τοῦ αὐτοῦ ἀπολογητικός, which was written, like that of the later Gregory, to excuse the writer's reluctance to accept the episcopate, and to set forth the responsibilities of the office. It is obvious, from comparing the two treatises, that the earlier had suggested the later one; and indeed Pope Gregory acknowledges his indebtedness in his prologue to the second book of the Regula. The second somewhat similar treatise had been that of Chrysostom, 'De Sacerdotio,' in six books, c. a.d. 382. It also sets forth the awful responsibilities of the episcopal office; but there are no signs of pope Gregory having drawn from it.
It is to be observed that the subject of all these treatises is the office of episcopacy; not the pastoral or priestly office in its wider sense, as now commonly understood: and it is noteworthy how prominent in Gregory's view of it are the duties of preaching and spiritual guidance of souls. It is regarded, indeed, in the first place as an office of government — locus regiminis, culmen regiminis, denote it frequently — and hence the exercise of discipline comes prominently in; and the chief pastor is viewed also as an intercessor between his flock and God — See e.g. I. 10 — but it is especially as a teacher, and a physician of souls, that he is spoken of throughout the treatise; as one whose peculiar duty it is to be conversant with all forms of spiritual disease, and so be able to suit his treatment to all cases, to preach the word, reprove, rebuke, exhort, with all long suffering and doctrine, and both by precept and example guide souls in the way of salvation. Gregory had not studied in vain the Pastoral Epistles of St. Paul. Remarkable indeed is his own discriminating insight, displayed throughout, into human characters and motives, and his perception of the temptations to which circumstances or temperament render various people — pastors as well as members of their flocks — peculiarly liable. No less striking, in this as in other works of his, is his intimate acquaintance with the whole of Holy Scripture. He knew it indeed through the Latin version only; his critical knowledge is frequently at fault; and far-fetched mystical interpretations, such as he delighted in, abound. But as a true expounder of its general moral and religious teaching he well deserves his name as one of the great Doctors of the Church. And, further, notwithstanding all his reverence for Councils and Fathers, as paramount authorities in matters of faith, it is to Scripture that he ever appeals as the final authority for conduct and belief.
Introduction
Gregory to his most reverend and most holy brother and fellow-bishop, John.
With kind and humble intent you reprove me, dearest brother, for having wished by hiding myself to fly from the burdens of pastoral care; as to which, lest to some they should appear light, I express with my pen in the book before you all my own estimate of their heaviness, in order both that he who is free from them may not unwarily seek them, and that he who has so sought them may tremble for having got them. This book is divided into four separate heads of argument, that it may approach the reader's mind by allegations arranged in order — by certain steps, as it were. For, as the necessity of things requires, we must especially consider after what manner every one should come to supreme rule; and, duly arriving at it, after what manner he should live; and, living well, after what manner he should teach; and, teaching aright, with how great consideration every day he should become aware of his own infirmity; lest either humility fly from the approach, or life be at variance with the arrival, or teaching be wanting to the life, or presumption unduly exalt the teaching. Wherefore, let fear temper the desire; but afterwards, authority being assumed by one who sought it not, let his life commend it. But then it is necessary that the good which is displayed in the life of the pastor should also be propagated by his speech. And at last it remains that, whatever works are brought to perfection, consideration of our own infirmity should depress us with regard to them, lest the swelling of elation extinguish even them before the eyes of hidden judgment. But inasmuch as there are many, like me in unskilfulness, who, while they know not how to measure themselves, are covetous of teaching what they have not learned; who estimate lightly the burden of authority in proportion as they are ignorant of the pressure of its greatness; let them be reproved from the very beginning of this book; so that, while, unlearned and precipitate, they desire to hold the citadel of teaching, they may be repelled at the very door of our discourse from the ventures of their precipitancy.
Chapter 1 - That the unskilful venture not to approach an office of authority.
No one presumes to teach an art till he has first, with intent meditation, learned it. What rashness is it, then, for the unskilful to assume pastoral authority, since the government of souls is the art of arts! For who can be ignorant that the sores of the thoughts of men are more occult than the sores of the bowels? And yet how often do men who have no knowledge whatever of spiritual precepts fearlessly profess themselves physicians of the heart, though those who are ignorant of the effect of drugs blush to appear as physicians of the flesh! But because, through the ordering of God, all the highest in rank of this present age are inclined to reverence religion, there are some who, through the outward show of rule within the holy Church, affect the glory of distinction. They desire to appear as teachers, they covet superiority to others, and, as the Truth attests, they seek the first salutations in the market-place, the first rooms at feasts, the first seats in assemblies Matthew 23:6-7, being all the less able to administer worthily the office they have undertaken of pastoral care, as they have reached the magisterial position of humility out of elation only. For, indeed, in a magisterial position language itself is confounded when one thing is learned and another taught. Against such the Lord complains by the prophet, saying, They have reigned, and not by Me; they have been set up as princes, and I knew it not Hosea 8:4. For those reign of themselves, and not by the Will of the Supreme Ruler, who, supported by no virtues, and in no way divinely called, but inflamed by their own desire, seize rather than attain supreme rule. But them the Judge within both advances, and yet knows not; for whom by permission he tolerates them surely by the judgment of reprobation he ignores. Whence to some who come to Him even after miracles He says, Depart from Me, you workers of iniquity, I know you not who you are Luke 13:27.
The unskilfulness of shepherds is rebuked by the voice of the Truth, when it is said through the prophet, The shepherds themselves have not known understanding Isaiah 56:11; whom again the Lord denounces, saying, And they that handle the law knew Me not Jeremiah 2:8. And therefore the Truth complains of not being known of them, and protests that He knows not the principality of those who know not Him; because in truth these who know not the things of the Lord are unknown of the Lord; as Paul attests, who says, But if any man knows not, he shall not be known 1 Corinthians 14:38. Yet this unskilfulness of the shepherds doubtless suits often the deserts of those who are subject to them, because, though it is their own fault that they have not the light of knowledge, yet it is in the dealing of strict judgment that through their ignorance those also who follow them should stumble. Hence it is that, in the Gospel, the Truth in person says, If the blind lead the blind, both fall into the ditch Matthew 15:14. Hence the Psalmist (not expressing his own desire, but in his ministry as a prophet) denounces such, when he says, Let their eyes be blinded that they see not, and ever bow down their back Psalm 68:24. For, indeed, those persons are eyes who, placed in the very face of the highest dignity, have undertaken the office of spying out the road; while those who are attached to them and follow them are denominated backs. And so, when the eyes are blinded, the back is bent, because, when those who go before lose the light of knowledge, those who follow are bowed down to carry the burden of their sins.
Chapter 2 - That none should enter on a place of government who practise not in life what they have learned by study.
There are some also who investigate spiritual precepts with cunning care, but what they penetrate with their understanding they trample on in their lives: all at once they teach the things which not by practice but by study they have learned; and what in words they preach by their manners they impugn. Whence it comes to pass that when the shepherd walks through steep places, the flock follows to the precipice. Hence it is that the Lord through the prophet complains of the contemptible knowledge of shepherds, saying, When you yourselves had drunk most pure water, you fouled the residue with your feet; and My sheep fed on that which had been trodden by your feet, and drank that which your feet had fouled Ezekiel 34:18-19. For indeed the shepherds drink most pure water, when with a right understanding they imbibe the streams of truth. But to foul the same water with their feet is to corrupt the studies of holy meditation by evil living. And verily the sheep drink the water fouled by their feet, when any of those subject to them follow not the words which they hear, but only imitate the bad examples which they see. Thirsting for the things said, but perverted by the works observed, they take in mud with their draughts, as from polluted fountains. Hence also it is written through the prophet, A snare for the downfall of my people are evil priests Hosea 5:1; 9:8.
Hence again the Lord through the prophet says of the priests, They are made to be for a stumbling-block of iniquity to the house of Israel. For certainly no one does more harm in the Church than one who has the name and rank of sanctity, while he acts perversely. For him, when he transgresses, no one presumes to take to task; and the offense spreads forcibly for example, when out of reverence to his rank the sinner is honoured. But all who are unworthy would fly from the burden of so great guilt, if with the attentive ear of the heart they weighed the sentence of the Truth, Whoever shall offend one of these little ones which believe in me, it were better for him that a millstone were hanged about his neck, and he were drowned in the depth of the sea Matthew 18:6. By the millstone is expressed the round and labour of worldly life, and by the depth of the sea is denoted final damnation. Whosoever, then, having come to bear the outward show of sanctity, either by word or example destroys others, it had indeed been better for him that earthly deeds in open guise should press him down to death than that sacred offices should point him out to others as imitable in his wrong-doing; because, surely, if he fell alone, the pains of hell would torment him in more tolerable degree.
Chapter 3 - Of the weight of government; and that all manner of adversity is to be despised, and prosperity feared.
So much, then, have we briefly said, to show how great is the weight of government, lest whosoever is unequal to sacred offices of government should dare to profane them, and through lust of pre-eminence undertake a leadership of perdition. For hence it is that James affectionately deters us, saying, Be not made many masters, my brethren James 3:1. Hence the Mediator between God and man Himself — He who, transcending the knowledge and understanding even of supernal spirits, reigns in heaven from eternity— on earth fled from receiving a kingdom. For it is written, When Jesus therefore perceived that they would come and take Him by force, to make Him a king, He departed again into the mountain Himself alone John 6:15.
For who could so blamelessly have had principality over men as He who would in fact have reigned over those whom He had Himself created? But, because He had come in the flesh to this end, that He might not only redeem us by His passion but also teach us by His conversation, offering Himself as an example to His followers, He would not be made a king; but He went of His own accord to the gibbet of the cross. He fled from the offered glory of pre-eminence, but desired the pain of an ignominious death; that so His members might learn to fly from the favours of the world, to be afraid of no terrors, to love adversity for the truth's sake, and to shrink in fear from prosperity; because this often defiles the heart through vain glory, while that purges it through sorrow; in this the mind exalts itself, but in that, even though it had once exalted itself, it brings itself low; in this man forgets himself, but in that, even perforce and against his will, he is recalled to memory of what he is; in this even good things done aforetime often come to nothing, but in that faults even of long standing are wiped away.
For commonly in the school of adversity the heart is subdued under discipline, while, on sudden attainment of supreme rule, it is immediately changed and becomes elated through familiarity with glory. Thus Saul, who had before fled in consideration of his unworthiness, no sooner had assumed the government of the kingdom than he was puffed up 1 Kings 10:22; 15:17-30; for, desirous of being honoured before the people while unwilling to be publicly blamed, he cut off from himself even him who had anointed him to the kingdom. Thus David, who in the judgment of Him who chose him was well pleasing to Him in almost all his deeds, as soon as the weight of pressure was removed, broke out into a swelling sore 2 Kings 11:3, seq, and, having been as a laxly running one in his appetite for the woman, became as a cruelly hard one in the slaughter of the man; and he who had before known pitifully how to spare the bad learned afterwards, without impediment of hesitation, to pant even for the death of the good 2 Kings 11:15. For, indeed, previously he had been unwilling to smite his captured persecutor; and afterwards, with loss to his wearied army, he destroyed even his devoted soldier. And in truth his crime would have snatched him farther away from the number of the elect, had not scourges called him back to pardon.
Chapter 4 - That for the most part the occupation of government dissipates the solidity of the mind.
Often the care of government, when undertaken, distracts the heart in various directions; and one is found unequal to dealing with particular things, while with confused mind divided among many. Whence a certain wise man providently dissuades, saying, My son, meddle not with many matters Sirach 11:10; because, that is, the mind is by no means collected on the plan of any single work while parted among various. And, when it is drawn abroad by unwonted care, it is emptied of the solidity of inward fear: it becomes anxious in the ordering of things that are without, and, ignorant of itself alone, knows how to think of many things, while itself it knows not. For, when it implicates itself more than is needful in things that are without, it is as though it were so occupied during a journey as to forget where it was going; so that, being estranged from the business of self-examination, it does not even consider the losses it is suffering, or know how great they are.
For neither did Hezekiah believe himself to be sinning 2 Kings 20:13, when he showed to the strangers who came to him his storehouses of spices; but he fell under the anger of the judge, to the condemnation of his future offspring, from what he supposed himself to be doing lawfully Isaiah 39:4. Often, when means are abundant, and many things can be done for subordinates to admire, the mind exalts itself in thought, and fully provokes to itself the anger of the judge, though not breaking out in overt acts of iniquity. For he who judges is within; that which is judged is within. When, then, in heart we transgress, what we are doing within ourselves is hidden from men. but yet in the eyes of the judge we sin. For neither did the King of Babylon then first stand guilty of elation Daniel 4:16, seq when he came to utter words of elation, inasmuch as even before, when he had given no utterance to his elation, he heard the sentence of reprobation from the prophet's mouth. For he had already wiped off the fault of the pride he had been guilty of, when he proclaimed to all the nations under him the omnipotent God whom he found himself to have offended.
But after this, elevated by the success of his dominion, and rejoicing in having done great things, he first preferred himself to all in thought, and afterwards, still vain-glorious, said, Is not this great Babylon, that I have built for the house of the kingdom, and in the might of my power, and for the honour of my majesty? Daniel 4:30 Which utterance of his, as we see, fell openly under the vengeance of the wrath which his hidden elation kindled. For the strict judge first sees invisibly what he afterwards reproves by publicly smiting it. Hence him He turned even into an irrational animal, separated him from human society, changed his mind and joined him to the beasts of the field, that in obviously strict and just judgment he who had esteemed himself great beyond men should lose even his being as a man. Now in adducing these things we are not finding fault with dominion, but guarding the infirmity of the heart from coveting it, lest any that are imperfect should venture to snatch at supreme rule, or those who stumble on plain ground set foot on a precipice.
Chapter 5 - Of those who are able to profit others by virtuous example in supreme rule, but fly from it in pursuit of their own ease.
For there are some who are eminently endowed with virtues, and for the training of others are exalted by great gifts, who are pure in zeal for chastity, strong in the might of abstinence, filled with the feasts of doctrine, humble in the long-suffering of patience, erect in the fortitude of authority, tender in the grace of loving-kindness, strict in the severity of justice. Truly such as these, if when called they refuse to undertake offices of supreme rule, for the most part deprive themselves of the very gifts which they received not for themselves alone, but for others also; and, while they meditate their own and not another's gain, they forfeit the very benefits which they desire to keep to themselves. For hence it was that the Truth said to His disciples, A city that is set on an hill cannot be hid: neither do they light a candle and put it under a bushel, but on a candlestick, that it may give light to all that are in the house Matthew 5:15. Hence He says to Peter, Simon, Son of Jonas, do you love Me? John 15:16-17; and he, when he had at once answered that he loved, was told, If you love Me, feed My sheep.
If, then, the care of feeding is the proof of loving, whosoever abounds in virtues, and yet refuses to feed the flock of God, is convicted of not loving the chief Shepherd. Hence Paul says, If Christ died for all, then all died. And if He died for all, it remains that they which live should now no longer live unto themselves, but unto Him which died for them and rose again 2 Corinthians 5:15. Hence Moses says Deuteronomy 25:5 that a surviving brother shall take to him the wife of a brother who has died without children, and beget children to the name of his brother; and that, if he haply refuse to take her, the woman shall spit in his face, and her kinsman shall loose the shoe from off one of his feet, and call his habitation the house of him that has his shoe loosed.
Now the deceased brother is He who, after the glory of the resurrection, said, Go tell My brethren Matthew 28:10. For He died as it were without children, in that He had not yet filled up the number of His elect. Then, it is ordered that the surviving brother shall have the wife assigned to him, because it is surely fit that the care of holy Church be imposed on him who is best able to rule it well. But, should he be unwilling, the woman spits in his face, because whosoever cares not to benefit others out of the gifts which he has received, the holy Church condemns even what he has of good, and, as it were, casts spittle on his face; and from one foot the shoe is taken away, inasmuch as it is written, Your feet shod in preparation of the Gospel of Peace Ephesians 6:15. If, then, we have the care of our neighbour as well as of ourselves upon us, we have each foot protected by a shoe. But he who, meditating his own advantage, neglects that of his neighbours, loses with disgrace one foot's shoe. And so there are some, as we have said, enriched with great gifts, who, while they are ardent for the studies of contemplation only, shrink from serving to their neighbour's benefit by preaching; they love a secret place of quiet, they long for a retreat for speculation. With respect to which conduct, they are, if strictly judged, undoubtedly guilty in proportion to the greatness of the gifts whereby they might have been publicly useful. For with what disposition of mind does one who might be conspicuous in profiting his neighbours prefer his own privacy to the advantage of others, when the Only-begotten of the supreme Father Himself came forth from the bosom of the Father into the midst of us all, that He might profit many?
Chapter 6 - That those who fly from the burden of rule through humility are then truly humble when they resist not the divine decrees.
There are some also who fly by reason only of their humility, lest they should be preferred to others to whom they esteem themselves unequal. And theirs, indeed, if it be surrounded by other virtues, is then true humility before the eyes of God, when it is not pertinacious in rejecting what it is enjoined to undertake with profit. For neither is he truly humble, who understands how the good pleasure of the Supernal Will ought to bear sway, and yet contemns its sway. But, submitting himself to the divine disposals, and averse from the vice of obstinacy, if he be already prevented with gifts whereby he may profit others also, he ought, when enjoined to undertake supreme rule, in his heart to flee from it, but against his will to obey.
Chapter 7 - That sometimes some laudably desire the office of preaching, while others, as laudably, are drawn to it by compulsion.
Although sometimes some laudably desire the office of preaching, yet others are as laudably drawn to it by compulsion; as we plainly perceive, if we consider the conduct of two prophets, one of whom offered himself of his own accord to be sent to preach, yet the other in fear refused to go. For Isaiah, when the Lord asked whom He should send, offered himself of his own accord, saying, Here I am; send me Isaiah 6:8. But Jeremiah is sent, yet humbly pleads that he should not be sent, saying, Ah, Lord God! Behold I cannot speak: for I am a child Jeremiah 1:6.
Lo, from these two men different voices proceeded outwardly, but they flowed from the same fountain of love. For there are two precepts of charity; the love of God and of our neighbour. Wherefore Isaiah, eager to profit his neighbours through an active life, desires the office of preaching; but Jeremiah, longing to cleave sedulously to the love of his Creator through a contemplative life, remonstrates against being sent to preach. Thus what the one laudably desired the other laudably shrunk from; the latter, lest by speaking he should lose the gains of silent contemplation; the former, lest by keeping silence he should suffer loss for lack of diligent work. But this in both cases is to be nicely observed, that he who refused did not persist in his refusal, and he who wished to be sent saw himself previously cleansed by a coal of the altar; lest any one who has not been purged should dare to approach sacred ministries, or any whom supernal grace has chosen should proudly gainsay it under a show of humility.
Wherefore, since it is very difficult for any one to be sure that he has been cleansed, it is safer to decline the office of preaching, though (as we have said) it should not be declined pertinaciously when the Supernal Will that it should be undertaken is recognized. Both requirements Moses marvellously fulfilled, who was unwilling to be set over so great a multitude, and yet obeyed. For perhaps he were proud, were he to undertake without trepidation the leadership of that innumerable people; and, again, proud he would plainly be were he to refuse to obey his Lord's command. Thus in both ways humble, in both ways submissive, he was unwilling, as measuring himself, to be set over the people; and yet, as presuming on the might of Him who commanded him, he consented. Hence, then, hence let all rash ones infer how great guilt is theirs, if they fear not to be preferred to others by their own seeking, when holy men, even when God commanded, feared to undertake the leadership of peoples. Moses trembles though God persuades him; and yet every weak one pants to assume the burden of dignity; and one who can hardly bear his own load without falling, gladly puts his shoulders under the pressure of others not his own: his own deeds are too heavy for him to carry, and he augments his burden.
Chapter 8 - Of those who covet pre-eminence, and seize on the language of the Apostle to serve the purpose of their own cupidity.
But for the most part those who covet pre-eminence seize on the language of the Apostle to serve the purpose of their own cupidity, where he says, If a man desire the office of a bishop, he desires a good work 1 Timothy 3:1. But, while praising the desire, he immediately turns what he has praised to fear when at once he adds, but a bishop must be blameless 1 Timothy 3:2. And, when he subsequently enumerates the necessary virtues, he makes manifest what this blamelessness consists in. And so, with regard to their desire, he approves them, but by his precept he alarms them; as if saying plainly, I praise what you seek; but first learn what it is you seek; lest, while you neglect to measure yourselves, your blamefulness appear all the fouler for its haste to be seen by all in the highest place of honour.
For the great master in the art of ruling impels by approval and checks by alarms; so that, by describing the height of blamelessness, he may restrain his hearers from pride, and, by praising the office which is sought, dispose them to the life required. Nevertheless it is to be noted that this was said at a time when whosoever was set over people was usually the first to be led to the torments of martyrdom. At that time, therefore, it was laudable to seek the office of a bishop, since through it there was no doubt that a man would come in the end to heavier pains. Hence even the office of a bishop itself is defined as a good work, when it is said, If a man desire the office of a bishop, he desires a good work 1 Timothy 3:1. Wherefore he that seeks, not this ministry of a good work, but the glory of distinction, is himself a witness against himself that he does not desire the office of a bishop; inasmuch as that man not only does not love at all the sacred office, but even knows not what it is, who, panting after supreme rule, is fed by the subjection of others in the hidden meditation of his thought, rejoices in his own praises, lifts up his heart to honour, exults in abundant affluence. Thus worldly gain is sought under color of that honour by which worldly gains should have been destroyed; and, when the mind thinks to seize on the highest post of humility for its own elation, it inwardly changes what it outwardly desires.
Chapter 9 - That the mind of those who wish for pre-eminence for the most part flatters itself with a feigned promise of good works.
But for the most part those who covet pastoral authority mentally propose to themselves some good works besides, and, though desiring it with a motive of pride, still muse how they will effect great things: and so it comes to pass that the motive suppressed in the depths of the heart is one thing, another what the surface of thought presents to the muser's mind. For the mind itself lies to itself about itself, and feigns with respect to good work to love what it does not love, and with respect to the world's glory not to love what it does love. Eager for domination, it becomes timid with regard to it while in pursuit, audacious after attainment. For, while advancing towards it, it is in trepidation lest it should not attain it; but all at once, on having attained, thinks what it has attained to be its just due. And, when it has once begun to enjoy the office of its acquired dominion in a worldly way, it willingly forgets what it has cogitated in a religious way. Hence it is necessary that, when such cogitation is extended beyond wont, the mind's eye should be recalled to works already accomplished, and that every one should consider what he has done as a subordinate; and so may he at once discover whether as a prelate he will be able to do the good things he has proposed to do.
For one can by no means learn humility in a high place who has not ceased to be proud while occupying a low one: one knows not how to fly from praise when it abounds, who has learned to pant for it when it was wanting: one can by no means overcome avarice, when advanced to the sustentation of many, whom his own means could not suffice for himself alone. Wherefore from his past life let every one discover what he is, lest in his craving for eminence the phantom of his cogitation illude him. Nevertheless it is generally the case that the very practice of good deeds which was maintained in tranquillity is lost in the occupation of government; since even an unskilful person guides a ship along a straight course in a calm sea; but in one disturbed by the waves of tempest even the skilled sailor is confounded. For what is eminent dominion but a tempest of the mind, in which the ship of the heart is ever shaken by hurricanes of thought, is incessantly driven hither and there, so as to be shattered by sudden excesses of word and deed, as if by opposing rocks? In the midst of all these dangers, then, what course is to be followed, what is to be held to, except that one who abounds in virtues should accede to government under compulsion, and that one who is void of virtues should not, even under compulsion, approach it? As to the former, let him beware lest, if he refuses altogether, he be as one who binds up in a napkin the money which he has received, and be judged for hiding it Matthew 25:18. For, indeed, to bind up in a napkin is to hide gifts received under the listlessness of sluggish torpor. But, on the other hand, let the latter, when he craves government, take care lest, by his example of evil deeds, he become an obstacle to such as are journeying to the entrance of the kingdom, after the manner of the Pharisees, who, according to the Master's voice Matthew 23:13, neither go in themselves nor suffer others to go in. And he should also consider how, when an elected prelate undertakes the cause of the people, he goes, as it were, as a physician to one that is sick. If, then, ailments still live in his body, what presumption is his, to make haste to heal the smitten, while in his own face carrying a sore!
Chapter 10 - What manner of man ought to come to rule.
That man, therefore, ought by all means to be drawn with cords to be an example of good living who already lives spiritually, dying to all passions of the flesh; who disregards worldly prosperity; who is afraid of no adversity; who desires only inward wealth; whose intention the body, in good accord with it, thwarts not at all by its frailness, nor the spirit greatly by its disdain: one who is not led to covet the things of others, but gives freely of his own; who through the bowels of compassion is quickly moved to pardon, yet is never bent down from the fortress of rectitude by pardoning more than is meet; who perpetrates no unlawful deeds, yet deplores those perpetrated by others as though they were his own; who out of affection of heart sympathizes with another's infirmity, and so rejoices in the good of his neighbour as though it were his own advantage; who so insinuates himself as an example to others in all he does that among them he has nothing, at any rate of his own past deeds, to blush for; who studies so to live that he may be able to water even dry hearts with the streams of doctrine; who has already learned by the use and trial of prayer that he can obtain what he has requested from the Lord, having had already said to him, as it were, through the voice of experience, While you are yet speaking, I will say, Here am I Isaiah 58:9.
For if perchance any one should come to us asking us to intercede for him with some great man, who was incensed against him, but to us unknown, we should at once reply, We cannot go to intercede for you, since we have no familiar acquaintance with that man. If, then, a man blushes to become an intercessor with another man on whom he has no claim, with what idea can any one grasp the post of intercession with God for the people, who does not know himself to be in favour with Him through the merit of his own life? And how can he ask of Him pardon for others while ignorant whether towards himself He is appeased? And in this matter there is yet another thing to be more anxiously feared; namely, lest one who is supposed to be competent to appease wrath should himself provoke it on account of guilt of his own. For we all know well that, when one who is in disfavour is sent to intercede with an incensed person, the mind of the latter is provoked to greater severity. Wherefore let one who is still tied and bound with earthly desires beware lest by more grievously incensing the strict judge, while he delights himself in his place of honour, he become the cause of ruin to his subordinates.
Chapter 11 - What manner of man ought not to come to rule.
Wherefore let every one measure himself wisely, lest he venture to assume a place of rule, while in himself vice still reigns unto condemnation; lest one whom his own guilt depraves desire to become an intercessor for the faults of others. For on this account it is said to Moses by the supernal voice, Speak unto Aaron; Whosoever he be of your seed throughout their generations that has a blemish, he shall not offer loaves of bread to the Lord his God Leviticus 21:17. And it is also immediately subjoined; If he be blind, if he be lame, if he have either a small or a large and crooked nose, if he be brokenfooted or brokenhanded, if he be hunchbacked, if he be bleareyed (lippus), if he have a white speck (albuginem) in his eye, if chronic scabies, if impetigo in his body, or if he be ruptured (ponderosus) Leviticus 21:18. For that man is indeed blind who is unacquainted with the light of supernal contemplation, who, whelmed in the darkness of the present life, while he beholds not at all by loving it the light to come, knows not whither he is advancing the steps of his conduct.
Hence by Hannah prophesying it is said, He will keep the feet of his saints, and the wicked shall be silent in darkness 1 Kings 2:9. But that man is lame who does indeed see in what direction he ought to go, but, through infirmity of purpose, is unable to keep perfectly the way of life which he sees, because, while unstable habit rises not to a settled state of virtue, the steps of conduct do not follow with effect the aim of desire. Hence it is that Paul says, Lift up the hands which hang down, and the feeble knees, and make straight paths for your feet, lest that which is lame be turned out of the way; but let it rather be healed Hebrews 12:12-13. But one with a small nose is he who is not adapted for keeping the measure of discernment. For with the nose we discern sweet odours and stenches: and so by the nose is properly expressed discernment, through which we choose virtues and eschew sins. Whence also it is said in praise of the bride, Your nose is as the tower which is in Lebanon Canticles 7:4; because, to wit, Holy Church, by discernment, espies assaults issuing from this or that quarter, and detects from an eminence the coming wars of vices.
But there are some who, not liking to be thought dull, busy themselves often more than needs in various investigations, and by reason of too great subtlety are deceived. Wherefore this also is added, Or have a large and crooked nose. For a large and crooked nose is excessive subtlety of discernment, which, having become unduly excrescent, itself confuses the correctness of its own operation. But one with broken foot or hand is he who cannot walk in the way of God at all, and is utterly without part or lot in good deeds, to such degree that he does not, like the lame man, maintain them however weakly, but remains altogether apart from them.
But the hunchbacked is he whom the weight of earthly care bows down, so that he never looks up to the things that are above, but is intent only on what is trodden on among the lowest. And he, should he ever hear anything of the good things of the heavenly country, is so pressed down by the weight of perverse custom, that he lifts not the face of his heart to it, being unable to erect the posture of his thought, which the habit of earthly care keeps downward bent. Of this kind of men the Psalmist says, I am bent down and am brought low continually Psalm 38:8. The fault of such as these the Truth in person reprobates, saying, But the seed which fell among thorns are they which, when they have heard the word, go forth, and are choked with cares and riches and pleasures of life, and bear no fruit Luke 8:14.
But the blear-eyed is he whose native wit flashes out for cognition of the truth, and yet carnal works obscure it. For in the blear-eyed the pupils are sound; but the eyelids, weakened by defluxion of humours, become gross; and even the brightness of the pupils is impaired, because they are worn continually by the flux upon them. The blear-eyed, then, is one whose sense nature has made keen, but whom a depraved habit of life confuses. To him it is well said through the angel, Anoint your eyes with eyesalve that you may see Revelation 3:18. For we may be said to anoint our eyes with eyesalve that we may see, when we aid the eye of our understanding for perceiving the clearness of the true light with the medicament of good conduct.
But that man has a white speck in his eye who is not permitted to see the light of truth, in that he is blinded by the arrogant assumption of wisdom or of righteousness. For the pupil of the eye, when black, sees; but, when it bears a white speck, sees nothing; by which we may understand that the perceiving sense of human thought, if a man understands himself to be a fool and a sinner, becomes cognizant of the clearness of inmost light; but, if it attributes to itself the whiteness of righteousness or wisdom, it excludes itself from the light of knowledge from above, and by so much the more fails entirely to penetrate the clearness of the true light, as it exalts itself within itself through arrogance; as of some it is said, Professing themselves to be wise, they became fools Romans 1:22.
But that man has chronic scabies whom the wantonness of the flesh without cease overmasters. For in scabies the violent heat of the bowels is drawn to the skin; whereby lechery is rightly designated, since, if the heart's temptation shoots forth into action, it may be truly said that violent internal heat breaks out into scabies of the skin: and it now wounds the body outwardly, because, while sensuality is not repressed in thought, it gains the mastery also in action.
For Paul had a care to cleanse away this itch of the skin, when he said, Let no temptation take you but such as is human 1 Corinthians 10:13; as if to say plainly, It is human to suffer temptation in the heart; but it is devilish, in the struggle of temptation, to be also overcome in action. He also has impetigo in his body whosoever is ravaged in the mind by avarice; which, if not restrained in small things, does indeed dilate itself without measure.
For, as impetigo invades the body without pain, and, spreading with no annoyance to him whom it invades, disfigures the comeliness of the members, so avarice, too, exulcerates, while it pleases, the mind of one who is captive to it. As it offers to the thought one thing after another to be gained, it kindles the fire of enmities, and gives no pain with the wounds it causes, because it promises to the fevered mind abundance out of sin.
But the comeliness of the members is destroyed, because the beauty of other virtues is also hereby marred: and it exulcerates as it were the whole body, in that it corrupts the mind with vices of all kinds; as Paul attests, saying, The love of money is the root of all evils 1 Timothy 6:10. But the ruptured one is he who does not carry turpitude into action, but yet is immoderately weighed down by it in mind through continual cogitation; one who is indeed by no means carried away to the extent of nefarious conduct; but his mind still delights itself without prick of repugnance in the pleasure of lechery. For the disease of rupture is when humor viscerum ad virilia labitur, quæ profecto cum molestia dedecoris intumescunt He, then, may be said to be ruptured who, letting all his thoughts flow down to lasciviousness, bears in his heart a weight of turpitude; and, though not actually doing deeds of shame, nevertheless in mind is not withdrawn from them. Nor has he power to rise to the practice of good living before the eyes of men, because, hidden within him, the shameful weight presses him down.
Whosoever, therefore, is subjected to any one of these diseases is forbidden to offer loaves of bread to the Lord, lest in truth he should be of no avail for expiating the sins of others, being one who is still ravaged by his own. And now, having briefly shown after what manner one who is worthy should come to pastoral authority, and after what manner one who is unworthy should be greatly afraid, let us now demonstrate after what manner one who has attained to it worthily should live in it.
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| Steps of the Soul's Ascent by Blessed Anna Maria Taigi |
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Posted by: Hildegard of Bingen - 02-12-2021, 04:11 PM - Forum: The Saints
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Part II – Steps of the Soul’s Ascent
Pages 87 of the Book “Wife, Mother and Mystic, Blessed Anna Maria Taigi.
This peace was bought by the Beata by a constant spirit of renunciation. Our Lord gave her this golden advice: “My daughter, spiritual profit consists neither in penance nor in the frequentation of the Sacraments, nay not even in abiding sorrow for sin, but in the union of your will with Mine. Those who which to follow My way must renounce their own will everywhere and in all things. Do what you do not wish to do; leave undone what you wish to do; one act of violence to oneself of this kind is much more pleasing to Me than an entire year of penances. You must not for the future use such language as: “I want this; that is pleasant, that other thing unpleasant, and I would much rather not do it” – such is the language of the world.” “She herself,” comments Cardinal Pedicini, “interpreted the necessity of renunciation in the following words: “To acquire the love of God one must always pull against the stream and never cease to resist one’s own will.”
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| Inside Planned Parenthood's Gender Factory |
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Posted by: Stone - 02-12-2021, 09:24 AM - Forum: Against the Children
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Inside Planned Parenthood's Gender Factory
An Ex-Reproductive Health Assistant Speaks Out
abigailshrier.substack.com [slightly adapted] | February 8, 2021
A month ago, I was sent a Tweetstorm written by a woman who had worked as a “reproductive health assistant” at Planned Parenthood for about 18 months prior to March 2020. If you assumed that the employee had abortion on her mind, then your knowledge of Planned Parenthood is outdated. Planned Parenthood is now one of the largest providers in the United States of cross-sex hormones like testosterone to females seeking medical gender transition.
The employee’s responsibilities included screening patients, taking down their lists of medications and medical histories before the nurse arrived to treat. (Later, I was able to interview her and verify her employment from an old paystub.)
The employee insisted (both on Twitter and during our interview) that she was reluctant to say anything critical of Planned Parenthood because she believes in its core mission.
“[T]hey still provide vital services for women,” she wrote on Twitter, and anti-abortion activists “will jump at any opportunity to smear them.” But she went on to write: “Having said that, their recent roles in trans activism are abhorrent, and they’re digging their own grave.”
The Planned Parenthood clinic where she worked was located in a small town of roughly 30,000. Abortions were the clinic’s “bread and butter,” something this employee fully supports. But, she noted, “trans identifying kids are cash cows, and they are kept on the hook for the foreseeable future in terms of follow-up appointments, bloodwork, meetings, etc., whereas abortions are (hopefully) a one-and-done situation.”
How significant is this revenue stream? I’ve never been able to obtain numbers on that, though the Planned Parenthood website for Central and Western New York states that: “Nationally, Planned Parenthood is the second largest provider of Gender Affirming Hormone Care.” It seems reasonable to conclude that hormone treatments—pricey as they are—now contribute materially to Planned Parenthood’s bottom line.
According to the employee, based on her recollection, 1-2 new biologically female teen patients seeking testosterone would arrive per day. A few reasonable assumptions and some arithmetic reveal that a shocking percentage of the town’s teen girls came through the clinic over just a few years.
There were no doctors at the clinic where she worked. Nurse practitioners were the professionals with the highest medical training, she said. The clinic employed a gender counselor who had “no actual professional credentials or formal training other than being MtF” (that is, a male-to-female transgender person). Adolescents would come and speak to this gender counselor and Planned Parenthood would then forward the counselor’s “notes to an actual licensed mental health professional somewhere off-site, and rubber stamp approve the patients to begin their transition. This is basically how they circumvented the requirement to speak to an actual counselor,” according to the employee’s Twitter post.
Whether patients received specific treatments—a course of testosterone, say—was decided by the “clinic manager,” with “no prior medical experience” whose prior job was “managing a Wendy’s,” the employee wrote.
Each day, new teen girls would present at the clinic (sometimes with mom). They often arrived in groups of girlfriends, all claiming childhood histories of gender dysphoria and asking to be put on testosterone. Did she believe their testimonies? “I think they were telling what they perceived to be their authentic history to them at the time. Like, I was a 13 year old girl, you know. Everything is very dire, everything needs to be remedied immediately,” she said.
In any case, the script Planned Parenthood instructed her to read from didn’t grant much room for evaluation of patient histories. “The questions that we asked were like, very closed ended…It would be, ‘you know, at what age did this start’? Boom that is it. ‘What kinds of dysphoria do you feel’? Boom that's it, you know? ‘What do you want out of your transition’? ‘Do you want top surgery?’ ‘Do you want bottom surgery’?”
In taking their histories, the employee did discover that these girls seemed to be suffering from a great deal of emotional pain. “A lot of them have serious emotional issues, a lot of them had a history of abuse and baggage.”
Anxiety, depression, and bipolar disorder were ubiquitous. Often, the employee said, they had visible “self-harm scars” and even “fresh self-harm marks.” But, she said, the medical professionals were never supposed to address those marks. “We just move on exactly the issue at hand”—that is, affirming the adolescents’ self-diagnosed dysphoria and proceeding to a course of treatment.
This treatment—testosterone—carries serious risks for adolescent girls, particularly at the doses at which it is administered, ten to forty times what their bodies would normally handle. Risks include deepened voice, increase in red blood cell count and greater risk of heart attack, infertility, endometrial cancer—as well as all the unknown risks the come with any major and novel intervention.
She would present the girls with pages that listed a series of medical risks and obtain signatures indicating their “informed consent.” Did any of the girls ever seem troubled by these risks? “I can say anecdotally that I never saw anybody read it,” she said.
Most interesting to me was the fact that, according to the employee, the girls would often arrive to the clinic with a group of friends. (For what other medical treatments do girls arrive with peer group in tow?) It smacked more of the gleeful trips teen girls once took to the mall for ear piercings than the sober medical treatment of a genuine mental health disorder.
What was the mood in the waiting room among these friends? “Super cheerful, giggly. It’s a fun thing,” she said, a touch of cynicism whetting her tone.
I asked her if she and the other nurses and reproductive health assistants didn’t think there was something suspicious about girls’ showing up in groups of friends for treatment—whether it didn’t cross the employees’ minds that peer influence might be at play. “It's kind of one of those things where you just roll your eyes.” She told me. “The extent of our intervention” was to grant “their requests to start the hormone therapy.”
Did she ever feel like she was participating in something wrong, I wondered. These were, by her own estimation, a notably vulnerable group of girls: they were on all kinds of medications for anxiety and depression and even anti-psychotics like Abilify and Clozaril. “I’ll tell you, I struggled with the morality and reconciling of our actions in giving these kids testosterone and estrogen and stuff. I struggled with that more than I did being in operating room for like a 20 week abortion. It’s a lot to see these kids, like, interpret their feelings in such a way that they end up being confused about their gender,” she said.
Did she or other staff members voice their misgivings about whether they were giving these girls the best treatment? “Yeah. Every day,” she said, before adding: “I mean, it would be one of those things that would be a conversation among professionals. You know, we’re nodding our heads, we’re doing this thing. And then we clock out at the end of the day because we cannot bring it up in discussion with management or the clinic directors or anything because they have these directives from administrators upstate.”
As far as she knew, did any of the girls asking to start a course of testosterone ever get turned down? Perhaps some were sent for psychiatric evaluation before proceeding with testosterone treatment? “None of the girls,” she said. “One of the boys who did confess that he smoked so much weed that he was doubling up on his estrogen… We did end up ceasing his therapy until he saw—I think it was like a substance abuse counselor or something like that. But other than that, we never turned away anybody.”
According to the Planned Parenthood employee’s testimony, in affirmative care clinics like this one, for teens seeking fast medical transition—the medicine cabinet is fully stocked, the customer is always right, and the light is always green.
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| St. Basil the Great: Nine Homilies of Hexaemeron |
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Posted by: Stone - 02-12-2021, 08:09 AM - Forum: Fathers of the Church
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Nine Homilies of Hexaemeron by St. Basil the Great
[The audiobook version of the Hexaemeron can be found here.]
Hexaemeron (Homily 1)
In the Beginning God made the Heaven and the Earth.
1. It is right that any one beginning to narrate the formation of the world should begin with the good order which reigns in visible things. I am about to speak of the creation of heaven and earth, which was not spontaneous, as some have imagined, but drew its origin from God. What ear is worthy to hear such a tale? How earnestly the soul should prepare itself to receive such high lessons! How pure it should be from carnal affections, how unclouded by worldly disquietudes, how active and ardent in its researches, how eager to find in its surroundings an idea of God which may be worthy of Him!
But before weighing the justice of these remarks, before examining all the sense contained in these few words, let us see who addresses them to us. Because, if the weakness of our intelligence does not allow us to penetrate the depth of the thoughts of the writer, yet we shall be involuntarily drawn to give faith to his words by the force of his authority. Now it is Moses who has composed this history; Moses, who, when still at the breast, is described as exceeding fair; Moses, whom the daughter of Pharaoh adopted; who received from her a royal education, and who had for his teachers the wise men of Egypt; Moses, who disdained the pomp of royalty, and, to share the humble condition of his compatriots, preferred to be persecuted with the people of God rather than to enjoy the fleeting delights of sin; Moses, who received from nature such a love of justice that, even before the leadership of the people of God was committed to him, he was impelled, by a natural horror of evil, to pursue malefactors even to the point of punishing them by death; Moses, who, banished by those whose benefactor he had been, hastened to escape from the tumults of Egypt and took refuge in Ethiopia, living there far from former pursuits, and passing forty years in the contemplation of nature; Moses, finally, who, at the age of eighty, saw God, as far as it is possible for man to see Him; or rather as it had not previously been granted to man to see Him, according to the testimony of God Himself, If there be a prophet among you, I the Lord will make myself known unto him in a vision, and will speak unto him in a dream. My servant Moses is not so, who is faithful in all mine house, with him will I speak mouth to mouth, even apparently and not in dark speeches. It is this man, whom God judged worthy to behold Him, face to face, like the angels, who imparts to us what he has learned from God. Let us listen then to these words of truth written without the help of the enticing words of man's wisdom 1 Corinthians 2:4 by the dictation of the Holy Spirit; words destined to produce not the applause of those who hear them, but the salvation of those who are instructed by them.
2. In the beginning God created the heaven and the earth. Genesis 1:1 I stop struck with admiration at this thought. What shall I first say? Where shall I begin my story? Shall I show forth the vanity of the Gentiles? Shall I exalt the truth of our faith? The philosophers of Greece have made much ado to explain nature, and not one of their systems has remained firm and unshaken, each being overturned by its successor. It is vain to refute them; they are sufficient in themselves to destroy one another. Those who were too ignorant to rise to a knowledge of a God, could not allow that an intelligent cause presided at the birth of the Universe; a primary error that involved them in sad consequences. Some had recourse to material principles and attributed the origin of the Universe to the elements of the world. Others imagined that atoms, and indivisible bodies, molecules and ducts, form, by their union, the nature of the visible world. Atoms reuniting or separating, produce births and deaths and the most durable bodies only owe their consistency to the strength of their mutual adhesion: a true spider's web woven by these writers who give to heaven, to earth, and to sea so weak an origin and so little consistency! It is because they knew not how to say In the beginning God created the heaven and the earth. Deceived by their inherent atheism it appeared to them that nothing governed or ruled the universe, and that was all was given up to chance. To guard us against this error the writer on the creation, from the very first words, enlightens our understanding with the name of God; In the beginning God created. What a glorious order! He first establishes a beginning, so that it might not be supposed that the world never had a beginning. Then he adds Created to show that which was made was a very small part of the power of the Creator. In the same way that the potter, after having made with equal pains a great number of vessels, has not exhausted either his art or his talent; thus the Maker of the Universe, whose creative power, far from being bounded by one world, could extend to the infinite, needed only the impulse of His will to bring the immensities of the visible world into being. If then the world has a beginning, and if it has been created, enquire who gave it this beginning, and who was the Creator: or rather, in the fear that human reasonings may make you wander from the truth, Moses has anticipated enquiry by engraving in our hearts, as a seal and a safeguard, the awful name of God: In the beginning God created — It is He, beneficent Nature, Goodness without measure, a worthy object of love for all beings endowed with reason, the beauty the most to be desired, the origin of all that exists, the source of life, intellectual light, impenetrable wisdom, it is He who in the beginning created heaven and earth.
3. Do not then imagine, O man! That the visible world is without a beginning; and because the celestial bodies move in a circular course, and it is difficult for our senses to define the point where the circle begins, do not believe that bodies impelled by a circular movement are, from their nature, without a beginning. Without doubt the circle (I mean the plane figure described by a single line) is beyond our perception, and it is impossible for us to find out where it begins or where it ends; but we ought not on this account to believe it to be without a beginning. Although we are not sensible of it, it really begins at some point where the draughtsman has begun to draw it at a certain radius from the centre. Thus seeing that figures which move in a circle always return upon themselves, without for a single instant interrupting the regularity of their course, do not vainly imagine to yourselves that the world has neither beginning nor end. For the fashion of this world passes away 1 Corinthians 7:31 and Heaven and earth shall pass away. Matthew 24:35 The dogmas of the end, and of the renewing of the world, are announced beforehand in these short words put at the head of the inspired history. In the beginning God made. That which was begun in time is condemned to come to an end in time. If there has been a beginning do not doubt of the end. Of what use then are geometry — the calculations of arithmetic — the study of solids and far-famed astronomy, this laborious vanity, if those who pursue them imagine that this visible world is co-eternal with the Creator of all things, with God Himself; if they attribute to this limited world, which has a material body, the same glory as to the incomprehensible and invisible nature; if they cannot conceive that a whole, of which the parts are subject to corruption and change, must of necessity end by itself submitting to the fate of its parts? But they have become vain in their imaginations and their foolish heart was darkened. Professing themselves to be wise, they became fools. Romans 1:21-22 Some have affirmed that heaven co-exists with God from all eternity; others that it is God Himself without beginning or end, and the cause of the particular arrangement of all things.
4. One day, doubtless, their terrible condemnation will be the greater for all this worldly wisdom, since, seeing so clearly into vain sciences, they have wilfully shut their eyes to the knowledge of the truth. These men who measure the distances of the stars and describe them, both those of the North, always shining brilliantly in our view, and those of the southern pole visible to the inhabitants of the South, but unknown to us; who divide the Northern zone and the circle of the Zodiac into an infinity of parts, who observe with exactitude the course of the stars, their fixed places, their declensions, their return and the time that each takes to make its revolution; these men, I say, have discovered all except one thing: the fact that God is the Creator of the universe, and the just Judge who rewards all the actions of life according to their merit. They have not known how to raise themselves to the idea of the consummation of all things, the consequence of the doctrine of judgment, and to see that the world must change if souls pass from this life to a new life. In reality, as the nature of the present life presents an affinity to this world, so in the future life our souls will enjoy a lot conformable to their new condition. But they are so far from applying these truths, that they do but laugh when we announce to them the end of all things and the regeneration of the age. Since the beginning naturally precedes that which is derived from it, the writer, of necessity, when speaking to us of things which had their origin in time, puts at the head of his narrative these words — In the beginning God created.
5. It appears, indeed, that even before this world an order of things existed of which our mind can form an idea, but of which we can say nothing, because it is too lofty a subject for men who are but beginners and are still babes in knowledge. The birth of the world was preceded by a condition of things suitable for the exercise of supernatural powers, outstripping the limits of time, eternal and infinite. The Creator and Demiurge of the universe perfected His works in it, spiritual light for the happiness of all who love the Lord, intellectual and invisible natures, all the orderly arrangement of pure intelligences who are beyond the reach of our mind and of whom we cannot even discover the names. They fill the essence of this invisible world, as Paul teaches us. For by him were all things created that are in heaven, and that are in earth, visible and invisible whether they be thrones or dominions or principalities or powers Colossians 1:16 or virtues or hosts of angels or the dignities of archangels. To this world at last it was necessary to add a new world, both a school and training place where the souls of men should be taught and a home for beings destined to be born and to die. Thus was created, of a nature analogous to that of this world and the animals and plants which live thereon, the succession of time, for ever pressing on and passing away and never stopping in its course. Is not this the nature of time, where the past is no more, the future does not exist, and the present escapes before being recognised? And such also is the nature of the creature which lives in time — condemned to grow or to perish without rest and without certain stability. It is therefore fit that the bodies of animals and plants, obliged to follow a sort of current, and carried away by the motion which leads them to birth or to death, should live in the midst of surroundings whose nature is in accord with beings subject to change. Thus the writer who wisely tells us of the birth of the Universe does not fail to put these words at the head of the narrative. In the beginning God created; that is to say, in the beginning of time. Therefore, if he makes the world appear in the beginning, it is not a proof that its birth has preceded that of all other things that were made. He only wishes to tell us that, after the invisible and intellectual world, the visible world, the world of the senses, began to exist.
The first movement is called beginning. To do right is the beginning of the good way. Just actions are truly the first steps towards a happy life. Again, we call beginning the essential and first part from which a thing proceeds, such as the foundation of a house, the keel of a vessel; it is in this sense that it is said, The fear of the Lord is the beginning of wisdom, Proverbs 9:10 that is to say that piety is, as it were, the groundwork and foundation of perfection. Art is also the beginning of the works of artists, the skill of Bezaleel began the adornment of the tabernacle. Often even the good which is the final cause is the beginning of actions. Thus the approbation of God is the beginning of almsgiving, and the end laid up for us in the promises the beginning of all virtuous efforts.
6. Such being the different senses of the word beginning, see if we have not all the meanings here. You may know the epoch when the formation of this world began, it, ascending into the past, you endeavour to discover the first day. You will thus find what was the first movement of time; then that the creation of the heavens and of the earth were like the foundation and the groundwork, and afterwards that an intelligent reason, as the word beginning indicates, presided in the order of visible things. You will finally discover that the world was not conceived by chance and without reason, but for an useful end and for the great advantage of all beings, since it is really the school where reasonable souls exercise themselves, the training ground where they learn to know God; since by the sight of visible and sensible things the mind is led, as by a hand, to the contemplation of invisible things. For, as the Apostle says, the invisible things of him from the creation of the world are clearly seen, being understood by the things that are made. Romans 1:20 Perhaps these words In the beginning God created signify the rapid and imperceptible moment of creation. The beginning, in effect, is indivisible and instantaneous. The beginning of the road is not yet the road, and that of the house is not yet the house; so the beginning of time is not yet time and not even the least particle of it. If some objector tell us that the beginning is a time, he ought then, as he knows well, to submit it to the division of time — a beginning, a middle and an end. Now it is ridiculous to imagine a beginning of a beginning. Further, if we divide the beginning into two, we make two instead of one, or rather make several, we really make an infinity, for all that which is divided is divisible to the infinite. Thus then, if it is said, In the beginning God created, it is to teach us that at the will of God the world arose in less than an instant, and it is to convey this meaning more clearly that other interpreters have said: God made summarily that is to say all at once and in a moment. But enough concerning the beginning, if only to put a few points out of many.
7. Among arts, some have in view production, some practice, others theory. The object of the last is the exercise of thought, that of the second, the motion of the body. Should it cease, all stops; nothing more is to be seen. Thus dancing and music have nothing behind; they have no object but themselves. In creative arts on the contrary the work lasts after the operation. Such is architecture — such are the arts which work in wood and brass and weaving, all those indeed which, even when the artisan has disappeared, serve to show an industrious intelligence and to cause the architect, the worker in brass or the weaver, to be admired on account of his work. Thus, then, to show that the world is a work of art displayed for the beholding of all people; to make them know Him who created it, Moses does not use another word. In the beginning, he says God created. He does not say God worked, God formed, but God created. Among those who have imagined that the world co-existed with God from all eternity, many have denied that it was created by God, but say that it exists spontaneously, as the shadow of this power. God, they say, is the cause of it, but an involuntary cause, as the body is the cause of the shadow and the flame is the cause of the brightness. It is to correct this error that the prophet states, with so much precision, In the beginning God created. He did not make the thing itself the cause of its existence. Being good, He made it an useful work. Being wise, He made it everything that was most beautiful. Being powerful He made it very great. Moses almost shows us the finger of the supreme artisan taking possession of the substance of the universe, forming the different parts in one perfect accord, and making a harmonious symphony result from the whole.
In the beginning God made heaven and earth. By naming the two extremes, he suggests the substance of the whole world, according to heaven the privilege of seniority, and putting earth in the second rank. All intermediate beings were created at the same time as the extremities. Thus, although there is no mention of the elements, fire, water and air, imagine that they were all compounded together, and you will find water, air and fire, in the earth. For fire leaps out from stones; iron which is dug from the earth produces under friction fire in plentiful measure. A marvellous fact! Fire shut up in bodies lurks there hidden without harming them, but no sooner is it released than it consumes that which has hitherto preserved it. The earth contains water, as diggers of wells teach us. It contains air too, as is shown by the vapours that it exhales under the sun's warmth when it is damp. Now, as according to their nature, heaven occupies the higher and earth the lower position in space, (one sees, in fact, that all which is light ascends towards heaven, and heavy substances fall to the ground); as therefore height and depth are the points the most opposed to each other it is enough to mention the most distant parts to signify the inclusion of all which fills up intervening Space. Do not ask, then, for an enumeration of all the elements; guess, from what Holy Scripture indicates, all that is passed over in silence.
8. In the beginning God created the heaven and the earth. If we were to wish to discover the essence of each of the beings which are offered for our contemplation, or come under our senses, we should be drawn away into long digressions, and the solution of the problem would require more words than I possess, to examine fully the matter. To spend time on such points would not prove to be to the edification of the Church. Upon the essence of the heavens we are contented with what Isaiah says, for, in simple language, he gives us sufficient idea of their nature, The heaven was made like smoke, that is to say, He created a subtle substance, without solidity or density, from which to form the heavens. As to the form of them we also content ourselves with the language of the same prophet, when praising God that stretches out the heavens as a curtain and spreads them out as a tent to dwell in. In the same way, as concerns the earth, let us resolve not to torment ourselves by trying to find out its essence, not to tire our reason by seeking for the substance which it conceals. Do not let us seek for any nature devoid of qualities by the conditions of its existence, but let us know that all the phenomena with which we see it clothed regard the conditions of its existence and complete its essence. Try to take away by reason each of the qualities it possesses, and you will arrive at nothing. Take away black, cold, weight, density, the qualities which concern taste, in one word all these which we see in it, and the substance vanishes.
If I ask you to leave these vain questions, I will not expect you to try and find out the earth's point of support. The mind would reel on beholding its reasonings losing themselves without end. Do you say that the earth reposes on a bed of air? How, then, can this soft substance, without consistency, resist the enormous weight which presses upon it? How is it that it does not slip away in all directions, to avoid the sinking weight, and to spread itself over the mass which overwhelms it? Do you suppose that water is the foundation of the earth? You will then always have to ask yourself how it is that so heavy and opaque a body does not pass through the water; how a mass of such a weight is held up by a nature weaker than itself. Then you must seek a base for the waters, and you will be in much difficulty to say upon what the water itself rests.
9. Do you suppose that a heavier body prevents the earth from falling into the abyss? Then you must consider that this support needs itself a support to prevent it from falling. Can we imagine one? Our reason again demands yet another support, and thus we shall fall into the infinite, always imagining a base for the base which we have already found. And the further we advance in this reasoning the greater force we are obliged to give to this base, so that it may be able to support all the mass weighing upon it. Put then a limit to your thought, so that your curiosity in investigating the incomprehensible may not incur the reproaches of Job, and you be not asked by him, Whereupon are the foundations thereof fastened? Job 38:6 If ever you hear in the Psalms, I bear up the pillars of it; see in these pillars the power which sustains it. Because what means this other passage, He has founded it upon the sea, if not that the water is spread all around the earth? How then can water, the fluid element which flows down every declivity, remain suspended without ever flowing? You do not reflect that the idea of the earth suspended by itself throws your reason into a like but even greater difficulty, since from its nature it is heavier. But let us admit that the earth rests upon itself, or let us say that it rides the waters, we must still remain faithful to thought of true religion and recognise that all is sustained by the Creator's power. Let us then reply to ourselves, and let us reply to those who ask us upon what support this enormous mass rests, In His hands are the ends of the earth. It is a doctrine as infallible for our own information as profitable for our hearers.
10. There are inquirers into nature who with a great display of words give reasons for the immobility of the earth. Placed, they say, in the middle of the universe and not being able to incline more to one side than the other because its centre is everywhere the same distance from the surface, it necessarily rests upon itself; since a weight which is everywhere equal cannot lean to either side. It is not, they go on, without reason or by chance that the earth occupies the centre of the universe. It is its natural and necessary position. As the celestial body occupies the higher extremity of space all heavy bodies, they argue, that we may suppose to have fallen from these high regions, will be carried from all directions to the centre, and the point towards which the parts are tending will evidently be the one to which the whole mass will be thrust together. If stones, wood, all terrestrial bodies, fall from above downwards, this must be the proper and natural place of the whole earth. If, on the contrary, a light body is separated from the centre, it is evident that it will ascend towards the higher regions. Thus heavy bodies move from the top to the bottom, and following this reasoning, the bottom is none other than the centre of the world. Do not then be surprised that the world never falls: it occupies the centre of the universe, its natural place. By necessity it is obliged to remain in its place, unless a movement contrary to nature should displace it. If there is anything in this system which might appear probable to you, keep your admiration for the source of such perfect order, for the wisdom of God. Grand phenomena do not strike us the less when we have discovered something of their wonderful mechanism. Is it otherwise here? At all events let us prefer the simplicity of faith to the demonstrations of reason.
11. We might say the same thing of the heavens. With what a noise of words the sages of this world have discussed their nature! Some have said that heaven is composed of four elements as being tangible and visible, and is made up of earth on account of its power of resistance, with fire because it is striking to the eye, with air and water on account of the mixture. Others have rejected this system as improbable, and introduced into the world, to form the heavens, a fifth element after their own fashioning. There exists, they say, an æthereal body which is neither fire, air, earth, nor water, nor in one word any simple body. These simple bodies have their own natural motion in a straight line, light bodies upwards and heavy bodies downwards; now this motion upwards and downwards is not the same as circular motion; there is the greatest possible difference between straight and circular motion. It therefore follows that bodies whose motion is so various must vary also in their essence. But, it is not even possible to suppose that the heavens should be formed of primitive bodies which we call elements, because the reunion of contrary forces could not produce an even and spontaneous motion, when each of the simple bodies is receiving a different impulse from nature. Thus it is a labour to maintain composite bodies in continual movement, because it is impossible to put even a single one of their movements in accord and harmony with all those that are in discord; since what is proper to the light particle, is in warfare with that of a heavier one. If we attempt to rise we are stopped by the weight of the terrestrial element; if we throw ourselves down we violate the igneous part of our being in dragging it down contrary to its nature. Now this struggle of the elements effects their dissolution. A body to which violence is done and which is placed in opposition to nature, after a short but energetic resistance, is soon dissolved into as many parts as it had elements, each of the constituent parts returning to its natural place. It is the force of these reasons, say the inventors of the fifth kind of body for the genesis of heaven and the stars, which constrained them to reject the system of their predecessors and to have recourse to their own hypothesis. But yet another fine speaker arises and disperses and destroys this theory to give predominance to an idea of his own invention.
Do not let us undertake to follow them for fear of falling into like frivolities; let them refute each other, and, without disquieting ourselves about essence, let us say with Moses God created the heavens and the earth. Let us glorify the supreme Artificer for all that was wisely and skillfully made; by the beauty of visible things let us raise ourselves to Him who is above all beauty; by the grandeur of bodies, sensible and limited in their nature, let us conceive of the infinite Being whose immensity and omnipotence surpass all the efforts of the imagination. Because, although we ignore the nature of created things, the objects which on all sides attract our notice are so marvellous, that the most penetrating mind cannot attain to the knowledge of the least of the phenomena of the world, either to give a suitable explanation of it or to render due praise to the Creator, to Whom belong all glory, all honour and all power world without end. Amen.
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| The Rule of St. Albert |
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Posted by: Stone - 02-12-2021, 07:18 AM - Forum: Church Doctrine & Teaching
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The Rule of Saint Albert
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Introduction
The text known as the Rule of Saint Albert is the foundational document setting out the spirit in which all members of the Carmelite Family are invited to live 'in allegiance to Jesus Christ'. It was approved as a formula vitae ('way of life') by Saint Albert Avogadro of Vercelli, sometime during his period as Latin Patriarch (Roman Catholic Bishop) of Jerusalem, between 1206 and 1214, and approved with some modifications by Pope Innocent IV in 1247. Although the shortest of all medieval 'rules', this text has proved to be full of wisdom and inspires thousands of Carmelites to this day.
The text below is a translation from the Latin text by Bede Edwards. The chapter numbering below is that agreed by the Carmelite and Discalced Carmelite Orders in 1999.
The Rule of Saint Albert
[1] Albert, called by God's favour to be Patriarch of the Church of Jerusalem, bids health in the Lord and the blessing of the Holy Spirit to his beloved sons in Christ, B. and the other hermits living under obedience to him, who live near the spring on Mount Carmel.
[2] Many and varied are the ways in which our saintly forefathers laid down how everyone, whatever his station or the kind of religious observance he has chosen, should live a life of allegiance to Jesus Christ - how, pure in heart and stout in conscience, he must be unswerving in the service of the Master.
[3] It is to me, however, that you have come for a rule of life in keeping with your avowed purpose, a rule you may hold fast to henceforward; and therefore:
[4] The first thing I require is for you to have a Prior, one of yourselves, who is to be chosen for the office by common consent, or that of the greater and maturer part of you. Each of the others must promise him obedience - of which, once promised, he must try to make his deeds the true reflection - and also chastity and the renunciation of ownership.
[5] If the Prior and the brothers see fit, you may have foundations in solitary places, or where you are given a site suitable and convenient for the observance proper to your Order.
[6] Next, each one of you is to have a separate cell, situated as the lie of the land you propose to occupy may dictate, and allotted by disposition of the Prior with the agreement of the other brothers, or the more mature among them.
[7] However, you are to eat whatever may have been given you in a common refectory, listening together meanwhile to a reading from Holy Scripture where that can be done without difficulty.
[8] None of the brothers is to occupy a cell other than that allotted to him, or to exchange cells with another, without leave of whoever is Prior at the time.
[9] The Prior's cell should stand near the entrance to your property, so that he may be the first to meet those who approach, and whatever has to be done in consequence may all be carried out as he may decide and order.
[10] Each one of you is to stay in his own cell or nearby, pondering the Lord's law day and night and keeping watch at his prayers unless attending to some other duty.
[11] Those who know how to say the canonical hours with those in orders should do so, in the way those holy forefathers of ours laid down, and according to the Church's approved custom. Those who do not know the hours must say twenty-five 'Our Fathers' for the night office, except on Sundays and solemnities when that number is to be doubled so that the 'Our Father' is said fifty times; the same prayer must be said seven times in the morning in place of Lauds, and seven times too for each of the other hours, except for Vespers when it must be said fifteen times.
[12] None of the brothers must lay claim to anything as his own, but you are to possess everything in common; and each is to receive from the Prior - that is from the brother he appoints for the purpose - whatever befits his age and needs.
[13] You may have as many asses and mules as you need, however, and may keep a certain amount of livestock or poultry.
[14] An oratory should be built as conveniently as possible among the cells, where, if it can be done without difficulty, you are to gather each morning to hear Mass.
[15] On Sundays too, or other days if necessary, you should discuss matters of discipline and your spiritual welfare; and on this occasion the indiscretions and failings of the brothers, if any be found at fault, should be lovingly corrected.
[16] You are to fast every day, except Sundays, from the feast of the Exaltation of the Holy Cross until Easter Day, unless bodily sickness or feebleness, or some other good reason, demand a dispensation from the fast; for necessity overrides every law.
[17] You are to abstain from meat, except as a remedy for sickness or feebleness. But as, when you are on a journey, you more often than not have to beg your way, outside your own houses you may eat foodstuffs that have been cooked with meat, so as to avoid giving trouble to your hosts. At sea, however, meat may be eaten.
[18] Since man's life on earth is a time of trial, and all who would live devotedly in Christ must undergo persecution, and the devil your foe is on the prowl like a roaring lion looking for prey to devour, you must use every care to clothe yourselves in God's armour so that you may be ready to withstand the enemy's ambush.
[19] Your loins are to be girt with chastity, your breast fortified by holy meditations, for as Scripture has it, holy meditation will save you. Put on holiness as your breastplate, and it will enable you to love the Lord your God with all your heart and soul and strength, and your neighbour as yourself. Faith must be your shield on all occasions, and with it you will be able to quench all the flaming missiles of the wicked one: there can be no pleasing God without faith; and the victory lies in this - your faith. On your head set the helmet of salvation, and so be sure of deliverance by our only Saviour, who sets his own free from their sins. The sword of the spirit, the word of God, must abound in your mouths and hearts. Let all you do have the Lord's word for accompaniment.
[20] You must give yourselves to work of some kind, so that the devil may always find you busy; no idleness on your part must give him a chance to pierce the defences of your souls. In this respect you have both the teaching and the example of Saint Paul the Apostle, into whose mouth Christ put his own words. God made him preacher and teacher of faith and truth to the nations: with him as your teacher you cannot go astray. We lived among you, he said, labouring and weary, toiling night and day so as not to be a burden to any of you; not because we had no power to do otherwise but so as to give you, in your own selves, as an example you might imitate. For the charge we gave you when we were with you was this: that whoever is not willing to work should not be allowed to eat either. For we have heard that there are certain restless idlers among you. We charge people of this kind, and implore them in the name of the Lord Jesus Christ, that they earn their own bread by silent toil. This is the way of holiness and goodness: see that you follow it.
[21] The Apostle would have us keep silence, for in silence he tells us to work. As the Prophet also makes known to us: Silence is the way to foster holiness. Elsewhere he says: Your strength will lie in silence and hope. For this reason I lay down that you are to keep silence from after Compline until after Prime the next day. At other times, although you need not keep silence so strictly, be careful not to indulge in a great deal of talk, for as Scripture has it - and experience teaches us no less - Sin will not be wanting where there is much talk, and He who is careless in speech will come to harm; and elsewhere: The use of many words brings harm to the speaker's soul. And our Lord says in the Gospel: Every rash word uttered will have to be accounted for on judgment day. Make a balance then, each of you, to weigh his words in; keep a tight rein on your mouths, lest you should stumble and fall in speech, and your fall be irreparable and prove mortal. Like the Prophet, watch your step lest your tongue give offence, and employ every care in keeping silent, which is the way to foster holiness.
[22] You, brother B., and whoever may succeed you as Prior, must always keep in mind and put into practice what our Lord said in the Gospel: Whoever has a mind to become a leader among you must make yourself servant to the rest, and whichever of you would be first must become your bondsman.
[23] You other brothers too, hold your Prior in humble reverence, your minds not on him but on Christ who has placed him over you, and who, to those who rule the Churches, addressed these words: Whoever pays you heed pays heed to me, and whoever treats you with dishonour dishonours me; if you remain so minded you will not be found guilty of contempt, but will merit life eternal as fit reward for your obedience.
[24] Here then are a few points I have written down to provide you with a standard of conduct to live up to; but our Lord, at his second coming, will reward anyone who does more than he is obliged to do. See that the bounds of common sense are not exceeded, however, for common sense is the guide of the virtues.
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