The mystery which the Church honors on this day is at the same time that of the triumph of Jesus Christ and the hallowed hope of His disciples. The Savior, after having accomplished His mission on earth, ascends to heaven to prepare for us an abiding-place. He ascends thither as our King, Liberator, Chief, and […]
The great saint, who feast is celebrated today was born at Theims, France, on the 30th of April, 1651. His parents were very careful about his early training, and insisted that their son should receive a thorough education, and that the moral side of his schooling command the utmost attention. Perceiving that his vocation was […]
Patron of farmers and rural communities, and of the United States National Rural Life Conference. Born and died in Madrid (1070-1130). Canonized 1622. As a child Isidore entered the service of John de Vergas, a wealthy landowner from Madrid. There he worked faithfully on Vergas’ farm for the rest of his life. He married a […]
Our Lady of Fatima is a title for the Virgin Mary due to her apparitions to three shepherd children at Fátima, Portugal on the thirteenth day of six consecutive months in 1917, beginning on May 13. The three children were Lúcia Santos and her cousins Jacinta and Francisco Marto. Many miracles have been associated with […]
St. Robert Bellarmine, of whom Pope Clement VIII said: “The Church of God had not his equal in learning,” was born of a noble family at Montepulciano in Tuscany, Italy, in 1542. He lived until 1621, and it was a full life conspicuous for exemplary piety. He suffered from delicate health all his life. Before […]
St. Lucia Filippini, of the Roman nobillity, was born in 1672 and baptized on the day of her birth. She received Holy Communion at a very early age, and when twelve years old was made a catechist of the children of the parish. She is the Foundress of the Institute of the Maestre Pie Filippini […]
STANISLAS was born in answer to prayer when his parents were advanced in age. Out of gratitude they educated him for the Church, and from a holy priest he became in time Bishop of Cracow. Boleslas II was then King of Poland — a prince of good disposition, but spoiled by a long course of victory […]
A DOMINICAN friar from his fifteenth year, Michael Ghislieri, as a simple religious, as bishop, and as cardinal, was famous for his intrepid defense of the Church’s faith and discipline, and for the spotless purity of his own life. His first care as Pope was to reform the Roman court and capital by the strict […]
In 1955, in order to insert a Christian dimension into the May Day festivities then almost monopolized by Marxists, Pope Pius XII made May 1st an annual Church celebration, the feast of St. Joseph the Worker. On that occasion the Pope noted that as labor strives to improve wages and working conditions…. the worker comes […]
CATHERINE, the daughter of a humble tradesman, was raised up to be the guide and guardian of the Church in one of the darkest periods of its history, the fourteenth century. As a child, prayer was her delight. She would say the “Hail Mary” on each step as she mounted the stairs, and was granted […]
CATHERINE, the daughter of a humble tradesman, was raised up to be the guide and guardian of the Church in one of the darkest periods of its history, the fourteenth century. As a child, prayer was her delight. She would say the “Hail Mary” on each step as she mounted the stairs, and was granted […]
IN 1205 the glorious martyr Peter was born at Verona, Italy, of heretical parents. He went to a Catholic school, and his Manichean uncle asked what he learnt. “The Creed,” answered Peter; “I believe in God, Creator of heaven and earth.” No persuasion could shake his faith, and at fifteen he received the habit from […]
Few men have contributed so much to spread Marian devotion as Louis-Marie Grignion de Montfort. He was a popular and vigorous missionary from the west of France, who died at the age of 43 in 1716, exhausted by his sermons and his penances. His famous books such as Mary’s Secret or The Treaty of True […]
This servant of God, canonized in 1933, was born on January 7, 1844 in Lourdes, France. While tending flocks outside the town, this simple, pious shepherdess used to pray before a grotto. One day, in 1858, she beheld there a beautiful lady clothed in white and blue with roses at her feet and a rosary […]
ST. MARTIN, who occupied the Roman See from A. D. 649 to 655, incurred the enmity of the Byzantine court by his energetic opposition to the Monothelite heresy, and the Exarch Olympius went so far as to endeavor to procure the assassination of the Pope as he stood at the altar in the Church of […]
ST. JULIUS was a Roman, and chosen Pope on the 6th of February in 337, shortly before the death of the Emperor Constantine the Great. The Arian bishops in the East sent to Julius three deputies to accuse St. Athanasius, the zealous Patriarch of Alexandria. These accusations, as the order of justice required, Julius imparted […]
BADEMUS was a rich and noble citizen of Bethlapeta in 4th century Persia, who founded a monastery near that city, which he governed with great sanctity. He conducted his religious in the paths of perfection with sweetness, prudence, and charity. To crown his virtue, God permitted him, with seven of his monks, to be apprehended […]
AT the tender age of twelve, Mary left her father’s house that she might sin without restraint, and for seventeen years she lived in shame at Alexandria. Then she accompanied a pilgrimage to Jerusalem, and entangled many in grievous sin. She was in that city on the Feast of the Exaltation of the Holy Cross, […]
ST. PERPETUUS was the eighth Bishop of Tours from St. Gatian, and governed that see above thirty years, from 461 to 491, when he died on the 8th of April. During all that time he labored by zealous sermons, many synods, and wholesome regulations, to lead souls to virtue. St. Perpetuus had a great veneration […]
HE was by birth a Jew, and belonged to the Church of Jerusalem, but travelling to Rome, he lived there nearly twenty years, from the pontificate of Anicetus to that of Eleutherius, in 177, when he returned into the East, where he died at an advanced age, probably at Jerusalem, in AD 180 according to […]
So named for the clandestine plans of Judas Iscariot. Matthew 26:14-16. “Then one of the Twelve called Judas Iscariot went to the chief priests, and said to them, ‘What are you willing to give me for delivering him to you?’ But they assigned him thirty pieces of silver. And from then on he sought out […]
Lessons without end, at once lofty and hallowing, might be deduced from the triumphant entry of Jesus Christ into Jerusalem, celebrated by the Church on this day. We limit ourselves, however, to considering the event under one aspect merely in order to draw therefrom a moral lesson for our spiritual instruction. Our Lord enters Jerusalem, […]
