Saint Boniface I, Pope

Feast date: Sep 04

Though few details are known of Boniface’s early life, he was elected Pope on December 28, 418. He is believed to have been ordained a priest by Pope Damasus I (366-384) and to have served as representative of Innocent I at Constantinople (c. 405).

Boniface was highly esteemed for his charitable and learned personality, which were clearly seen and lived through the service of his priestly duties.

At the death of Pope Zosimus in 418, two Popes were elected, Boniface and Eulalius. They were sent away from Rome by the emperor until the difficulty would be cleared. Eulalius failed to respect the Emperor’s decree and thus Boniface was recognized as the legitimate Pope.

Boniface’s reign was marked by great zeal and activity in disciplinary organization and control. He worked to reform certain corrupt practices and reduced the privileges granted to certain bishops.

He ardently supported St. Augustine in his fight against Pelagianism, and Augustine devoted several works to him.

 

Pope Saint Boniface died in Rome, September 4, 422.

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Saint Gregory the Great

Feast date: Sep 03

St. Gregory the Great, a central figure of the medieval western Church and one of the most admired Popes in history, is commemorated in the Ordinary Form of the Roman Catholic liturgy today, September 3.

Born near the middle of the sixth century into a noble Roman family, Gregory received a classical education in liberal arts and the law. He also had strong religious formation from his devout family, particularly from his mother, Silvia, also a canonized saint. By around age 30, Gregory had
advanced to high political office in Rome, during what was nevertheless a period of marked decline for the city.

Some time after becoming the prefect of the former imperial capital, Gregory chose to leave the civil administration to become a monk during the rise of the Benedictine order. In reality, however, the new monk’s great career in public life was yet to come.

After three years of strict monastic life, he was called personally by the Pope to assume the office of a deacon in Rome. From Rome, he was dispatched to Constantinople, to seek aid from the emperor for Rome’s civic troubles, and to aid in resolving the Eastern church’s theological controversies. He returned to Rome in 586, after six years of service as the Papal representative to the eastern Church and empire.

Rome faced a series of disasters caused by flooding in 589, followed by the death of Pope Pelagius II the next year. Gregory, then serving as abbot in a monastery, reluctantly accepted his election to replace him as the Bishop of Rome.

Despite this initial reluctance, however, Pope Gregory began working tirelessly to reform and solidify the Roman liturgy, the disciplines of the Church, the military and economic security of Rome, and the Church’s spreading influence in western Europe.

As Pope, Gregory brought his political experience at Rome and Constantinople to bear, in the task of preventing the Catholic Church from becoming subservient to any of the various groups struggling for control of the former imperial capital. As the former abbot of a monastery, he strongly supported the Benedictine movement as a bedrock of the western Church. He sent missionaries to England, and is given much of the credit for the nation’s conversion.

In undertaking these works, Pope Gregory saw himself as the “servant of the servants of God.” He was the first of the Bishops of Rome to popularize the now-traditional Papal title, which referred to Christ’s command that those in the highest position of leadership should be “the last of all and the servant of all.”

Even as he undertook to consolidate Papal power and shore up the crumbling Roman west, St. Gregory the Great maintained a humble sense of his mission as a servant and pastor of souls, from the time of his election until his death in 604.

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Martyrs of September

Feast date: Sep 02

The September Martyrs are a group of 191 faithful Christians who were martyred at the hands of the French Revolution on September 2 and 3, 1792.

After refusing to take an oath in support of the civil consititution of the clergy, an act condemned by the Vatican which placed Catholic priests under the authority and control of the state, these priests and religious brothers and sisters were imprisoned in a Carmelite convent and then massacred in the space of two days by bloodthirsty revolutionary mobs.

They were beatified on October 17, 1926 by Pope Pius XI.

 

Among the martyrs were Louis and Francis de la Rochefoucauld, the bishops of Saintes and Beauvais respectively, Apollinaris of Posat, John Francis Burte, Charles de la Calmette, Augustine Ambrose Chevreux, Andre Grasset de Saint Sauveur, John Mary de Lau, Severin Girault, Julian Massey, and Louis Barreau de la Touche.

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Saint Beatrice da Silva Meneses

Feast date: Sep 01

St. Beatrice was born to Portuguese nobility in Cuerta, Portugal, in 1424.  She was the daughter of the Count of Viana, and the sister of Saint Amadeus of Portugal. She was raised in the household of the future Queen Isabel of Portugal and spent some time in her royal court in Castile following the Queen’s marriage to John II.

She soon got tired of the empty life at court and joined a Cistercian convent in Toledo.  She lived at the convent until 1484, when she answered a summons from God to found a religious order. The Congregation of the Immaculate Conception of the Blessed Virgin Mary was begun, and with the help of the Queen, she founded a house outside of Toledo where she lived and served as superior until her death  on September 1, 1490.

Saint Beatrice was canonized in 1976 by Pope Paul VI.

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Saint Aristides

Feast date: Aug 31

Not much is known about the life of St. Aristides, excpet that he lived during the second century and was an avid confessor of the faith and Athenian philosopher. He wrote an Apologia for Christianity, which he presented to Emperor Hadrian in 125. His text was included in a work by Sts. Barlaam and Josaphat.

His feast day is August 31.

Printed with permission from Catholic-Defense.

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Saint Jeanne Jugan

Feast date: Aug 30

On Aug. 30, the Catholic Church celebrates Saint Jeanne Jugan, also known as Sister Mary of the Cross. During the 19th century, she founded the Little Sisters of the Poor with the goal of imitating Christ’s humility through service to elderly people in need.

In his homily for her canonization in October 2009, Pope Benedict XVI praised St. Jeanne as “a beacon to guide our societies” toward a renewed love for those in old age. The Pope recalled how she “lived the mystery of love” in a way that remains “ever timely while so many elderly people are suffering from numerous forms of poverty and solitude and are sometimes also abandoned by their families.”

Born on Oct. 25, 1792 in a port city of the French region of Brittany, Jeanne Jugan grew up during the political and religious upheavals of the French Revolution. Four years after she was born, her father was lost at sea. Her mother struggled to provide for Jeanne and her three siblings, while also providing them secretly with religious instruction amid the anti-Catholic persecutions of the day.

Jeanne worked as a shepherdess, and later as a domestic servant. At age 18, and again six years later, she declined two marriage proposals from the same man. She told her mother that God had other plans, and was calling her to “a work which is not yet founded.”

At age 25, the young woman joined the Third Order of St. John Eudes, a religious association for laypersons founded during the 17th century. Jeanne worked as a nurse in the town of Saint-Servan for six years, but had to leave her position due to health troubles. Afterward she worked for 12 years as the servant of a fellow member of the third order, until the woman’s death in 1835.

During 1839, a year of economic hardship in Saint-Servan, Jeanne was sharing an apartment with an older woman and an orphaned young lady. It was during the winter of this year that Jeanne encountered Anne Chauvin, an elderly woman who was blind, partially paralyzed, and had no one to care for her.

Jeanne carried Anne home to her apartment and took her in from that day forward, letting the woman have her bed while Jeanne slept in the attic. She soon took in two more old women in need of help, and by 1841 she had rented a room to provide housing for a dozen elderly people. The following year, she acquired an unused convent building that could house 40 of them.

During the 1840s, many other young women joined Jeanne in her mission of service to the elderly poor. By begging in the streets, the foundress was able to establish four more homes for their beneficiaries by the end of the decade. By 1850, over 100 women had joined the congregation that had become known as the Little Sisters of the Poor.

However, Jeanne Jugan – known in religious life as Sister Mary of the Cross – had been forced out of her leadership role by Father Auguste Le Pailleur, the priest who had been appointed superior general of the congregation. In an apparent effort to suppress her true role as foundress, the superior general ordered her into retirement and a life of obscurity for 27 years.

During these years, she served the order through her prayers and by accepting the trial permitted by God. At the time of her death on Aug. 29, 1879, she was not known to have founded the order, which by then had 2,400 members serving internationally. Fr. Le Pailleur, however, was eventually investigated and disciplined, and St. Jeanne Jugan came to be acknowledged as their foundress.

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The Beheading of John the Baptist

Feast date: Aug 29

On this day, the universal Church marks the beheading of John the Baptist, who prepared the way for Jesus. As an adult, he lived as a hermit in the wilderness. After the Spirit inspired him, he went about preaching that the people should repent of their sins and be baptized in order to prepare for the Messiah.

Herod imprisoned John because he had condemned Herod for committing adultery by living with his brother’s wife, Herodias.

 At he celebration for Herod on his birthday, the daughter of Herodias danced for him, and Herod was so impressed that he said he would offer her anything she liked. She consulted with Herodias who told her to ask for the head of John the Baptist on a platter. Herod did not want to kill John for fear or what his follwers might do, but because of his promise to the girl he could not refuse, and so John was beheaded.

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St. Augustine

Feast date: Aug 28

Today, August 28, the Church honors St. Augustine. St. Augustine was born at the town of Thagaste (now Souk-Ahras in modern day Algeria) on November 13, 354 and grew to become one the most significant and influential thinkers in the history of the Catholic Church. His teachings were the foundation of Christian doctrine for a millennium.

The story of his life, up until his conversion, is written in the autobiographical Confessions, the most intimate and well-known glimpse into an individual’s soul ever written, as well as a fascinating philosophical, theological, mystical, poetic and literary work.

Augustine, though being brought up in early childhood as a Christian, lived a dissolute life of revelry and sin, and soon drifted away from the Church – thinking that he wasn’t necessarily leaving Christ, of whose name he acknowledges “I kept it in the recesses of my heart; and all that presented itself to me without that Divine name, though it might be elegant, well written, and even replete with truth, did not altogether carry me away” (Confessions, I, iv).

He went to study in Carthage and became well-known in the city for his brilliant mind and rhetorical skills and sought a career as an orator or lawyer. But he also discovered and fell in love with philosophy at the age of 19, a love he pursued with great vehemence.

He was attracted to Manichaeanism at this time, after its devotees had promised him that they had scientific answers to the mystery of nature, could disprove the Scriptures, and could explain the problem of evil. Augustine became a follower for nine years, learning all there was to learn in it before rejecting it as incoherent and fraudulent.

He went to Rome and then Milan in 386 where he met Saint Ambrose, the bishop and Doctor of the Church, whose sermons inspired him to look for the truth he had always sought in the faith he had rejected. He received baptism and soon after, his mother, Saint Monica, died with the knowledge that all she had hoped for in this world had been fulfilled.

He returned to Africa, to his hometown of Tagaste, “having now cast off from himself the cares of the world, he lived for God with those who accompanied him, in fasting, prayers, and good works, meditating on the law of the Lord by day and by night.”

On a visit to Hippo he was proclaimed priest and then bishop against his will. He later accepted it as the will of God and spent the rest of his life as the pastor of the North African town, where he spent much time refuting the writings of heretics. 

Augustine also wrote, The City of God, against the pagans who charged that the fall of the Roman empire, which was taking place at the hands of the Vandals, was due to the spread of Christianity. 

On August 28, 430, as Hippo was under siege by the Vandals, Augustine died, at the age of 76. His legacy continues to deeply shape the face of the Church to this day.

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St. Monica

Feast date: Aug 27

On August 27, one day before the feast of her son St. Augustine, the Catholic Church honors St. Monica, whose holy example and fervent intercession led to one of the most dramatic conversions in Church history.

Monica was born into a Catholic family in 332, in the North African city of Tagaste located in present-day Algeria. She was raised by a maidservant who taught her the virtues of obedience and temperance. While still relatively young, she married Patricius, a Roman civil servant with a bad temper and a disdain for his wife’s religion.

Patricius’ wife dealt patiently with his distressing behavior, which included infidelity to their marriage vows. But she experienced a greater grief when he would not allow their three children – Augustine, Nagivius, and Perpetua – to receive Baptism. When Augustine, the oldest, became sick and was in danger of death, Patricius gave consent for his Baptism, but withdrew it when he recovered.

Monica’s long-suffering patience and prayers eventually helped Patricius to see the error of his ways, and he was baptized into the Church one year before his death in 371. Her oldest son, however, soon embraced a way of life that brought her further grief, as he fathered a child out of wedlock in 372. One year later, he began to practice the occult religion of Manichaeism.

In her distress and grief, Monica initially shunned her oldest son. However, she experienced a mysterious dream that strengthened her hope for Augustine’s soul, in which a messenger assured her: “Your son is with you.” After this experience, which took place around 377, she allowed him back into her home, and continued to beg God for his conversion.

But this would not take place for another nine years. In the meantime, Monica sought the advice of local clergy, wondering what they might do to persuade her son away from the Manichean heresy. One bishop, who had once belonged to that sect himself, assured Monica that it was “impossible that the son of such tears should perish.”

These tears and prayers intensified when Augustine, at age 29, abandoned Monica without warning as she passed the night praying in a chapel. Without saying goodbye to his mother, Augustine boarded a ship bound for Rome. Yet even this painful event would serve God’s greater purpose, as Augustine left to become a teacher in the place where he was destined to become a Catholic.

Under the influence of the bishop St. Ambrose of Milan, Augustine renounced the teaching of the Manichees around 384. Monica followed her son to Milan, and drew encouragement from her son’s growing interest in the saintly bishop’s preaching. After three years of struggle against his own desires and perplexities, Augustine succumbed to God’s grace and was baptized in 387.

Shortly before her death, Monica shared a profound mystical experience of God with Augustine, who chronicled the event in his “Confessions.” Finally, she told him: “Son, for myself I have no longer any pleasure in anything in this life. Now that my hopes in this world are satisfied, I do not know what more I want here or why I am here.”

“The only thing I ask of you both,” she told Augustine and his brother Nagivius, “is that you make remembrance of me at the altar of the Lord wherever you are.”

St. Monica died at age 56, in the year 387. In modern times, she has become the inspiration for the St. Monica Sodality, which encourages prayer and penance among Catholics whose children have left the faith.

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St. Jeanne Elizabeth des Bichier des Anges

Feast date: Aug 26

St. Jeanne was born July 1773 at La Blanc, France and died August 26, 1838. She was canonized in 1947 by Pope Pius XII.

Born to nobility and educated in a convent school, Jeanne Elizabeth witnessed closely and was personally affected by the events of the French Revolution which shook France when she was just 16 years old.

Upon the death of her father, she moved to La Guimetiere with her mother, and in 1796, realizing that she needed to do something to defend the Church and keep the faith alive amidst the attacks of the revolutionaries, she decided to begin a ministry of teaching and serving the poor.

She gathered groups of faithful in the town – which was at this point without a priest or community of religious – and organized meetings of prayer, studying of the Scriptures, and singing hymns.

She entered a Carmelite convent upon her mother’s death in 1804, and later the Society of Providence, with the advice of Saint Andrew Fournet, an underground priest who was forced to remain clandestine because he refused to make a pledge of allegiance to the government of the new republic.

He realized that she was the one God had called to lead a community of women he had gathered, and she cofounded the Daughters of the Cross with him in 1807 to care for the sick and poor, and to teach the faith.

By the time of her death in 1838, the community had more than 60 houses all over France.

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