This Day in the Church

St. Nicholas of Tolentino, a native of Sant’ Angelo, in the diocese of Fermo, was born about the year 1245. As a young man, but already endowed with a canon’s stall, he was one day greatly affected by a sermon preached by a Hermit of St. Augustine and decided to enter this newly-founded Order. At first he lived at the hermitage of Pesaro and then at Tolentino where he died in 1305. His whole life was remarkable for its great austerity which was inspired by his great love of the cross. According to the 1962 Missal of St. John XXIII the Extraordinary Form of the Roman Rite, today is his feast.

Peter Claver was born of a distinguished family in Catalonia, Spain. He became a Jesuit in 1604, and left for Colombia in 1610, dedicating himself to the service of black slaves. For thirty-three years he ministered to slaves, caring for the sick and dying, and instructing the slaves through catechists. Through his efforts three hundred thousand souls entered the Church. He is the Patron of the Negro Missions.

Mary was born to be the mother of the Savior of the world, the spiritual mother of all men, and the holiest of God’s creatures. Because of her Son’s infinite merits, she was conceived and born immaculate and full of grace. Through her, Queen of heaven and of earth, all grace is given to men. Through her, by the will of the Trinity, the unbelieving receive the gift of faith; the afflicted are tendered the works of mercy; and the members of Christ grow in likeness of their Head. In Mary all human nature is exalted. We rejoice in her birthday, as the Church has done from the earliest times. This is one of the three birthdays in the Church Calendar — the Birth of Jesus (December 25), the Birth of John the Baptist (June 24) and the Birthday of Mary. All three were born without original sin, although Mary and Jesus were conceived without sin, and St. John was cleansed of original sin while in the womb at the Visitation of Mary.

According to tradition today is the feast of St. Regina (Reine) who after undergoing many cruel torments, was beheaded for the faith at Aliza, formerly a large town called Alexia, famous for the siege which Caesar laid to it, now a small village in the diocese of Autun in Burgundy. Her martyrdom happened in the persecution of Decius, in 251, or under Maximian Herecleus in 286, as some Martyrologies mention. She is honored in many ancient Martyrologies. Her relics are kept with great devotion in the neighboring abbey of Flavigni, a league distant, whither they were translated in 864, and where they have been rendered famous by miracles and pilgrimages, of which a history is published by two monks of that abbey. — Butler’s “Lives of the Saints”

Today the Missionaries of Charity and their friends will be celebrating the feast day of newly canonized St. Teresa of Calcutta. September 5th is the anniversary of her death, and at present is acknowledged as her feast day.

St. Rosalia
St. Rosalia is the patroness of Palermo, and the citizens of that place annually celebrate two feasts in her honour. One of these was raised to the rank of a holy day of obligation by Pius XI in 1927. It is celebrated by a procession of unequalled magnificence, heralded by cannon fire. The saint’s shrine, atop a gigantic carriage filled with musicians, is drawn through the town by forty mules, accompanied by prayers, hymns, and acclamations. The top of the carriage is level with the roofs of the houses; fireworks are set off everywhere; the musicians blow ceaselessly on their trumpets; and for the five days during which this celebration lasts, enthusiasm mounts to an increasingly high pitch.

St. Gregory, senator and prefect of Rome, then in succession monk, cardinal and pope, governed the Church from 590 to 604. England owes her conversion to him. At a period when the invasion of the barbarians created a new situation in Europe, he played a considerable part in the transitional stage, during which a great number of them were won for Christ. At the same time he watched over the holiness of the clergy and preserved ecclesiastical discipline, as well as attending to the temporal interests of his people of Rome and the spiritual interests of the whole of Christendom. To him the liturgy owes several of its finest prayers, and the name “Gregorian chant” recalls this great Pope’s work in the development of the Church’s chant. His commentaries on Holy Scripture exercised a considerable influence on Christian thought, particularly in the Middle Ages. Together with St. Ambrose, St. Augustine and St. Jerome, he is one of the four great Doctors of the Latin Church.

Blessed André Grasset (1758 – 1792)
He was born in Montréal on 3 April 1758, the son of a prosperous merchant and former secretary to two governors of Montréal. The family returned to France in 1764.

He was ordained priest in 1783 and became a canon and cathedral treasurer at Sens just as the French Revolution was beginning.

In the face of persecution he took shelter with the Eudist fathers in Paris. He was executed in the massacre of the Hôtel des Carmes on 2 September 1792, together with almost 200 other priests, religious and laymen.

He was beatified by Pope Pius XI on 17 October 1926.

According to the 1962 Missal of St. John XXIII the Extraordinary Form of the Roman Rite, today is the feast of St. Giles who was an abbot of the seventh century. He probably lived in the neighborhood of Beziers on the coast of the Mediterranean. The little monastery of St. Peter, where his body rested, became one of the most popular shrines in Christendom and gave rise to a town. The cult of St. Giles, which was general in France, where there are upwards of one hundred and fifty churches dedicated to him, soon spread throughout the west.

According to the 1962 Missal of St. John XXIII the Extraordinary Form of the Roman Rite, today is the feast of St. Raymund Nonnatus who devoted his life to the ransoming of Christians held prisoner by the Mohammedans. He was one of the first members of the Order of Our Lady of Ransom (or Mercedarians) founded by St. Peter Nolasco and St. Raymund of Penafort. Having been sent to Africa he obtained the freedom of many captives; he offered his own person as a pledge for ransom that was not forthcoming in order to preserve from apostasy those whose faith was wavering. When he was set free he was made a Cardinal by Gregory IX and died on his return to Rome in 1240.