St. Damien of Molokai

Blessed Louis and Zelie Martin

"Seminarian with Maui links assists pope during ceremony"

From The Maui News

By Claudine San Nicolas

Photo at left: Patrick “Pat” Arensberg holds niece Julia Kaitlyn Smith during a family reunion two years ago in Hawaii.

A seminarian with ties to Maui held the microphone for Pope Benedict XVI throughout Sunday's canonization of St. Damien in Rome.

Patrick "Pat" Arensberg was born on Maui on Jan. 3, 1984, coincidentally the same birthday of Hawaii's first saint, Father Damien de Veuster, a 19th-century Sacred Hearts priest who served Hansen's disease patients in Kalaupapa.

Arensberg, 25, was baptized and received his first communion at Christ the King Church in Kahului. He attended Lihikai Elementary School up until the 3rd-grade when his parents, Joseph "Joe" and Julie Golis Arensberg, moved their family of seven children to the Mainland.

The Arensbergs - Joe, a 1975 St. Anthony High School graduate, and Julie, a 1974 Maui High alumna, have lived in Mobile, Ala., for the last 15 years. Pat is the fourth of their seven children and is studying at the North American seminary in Rome.

Contacted by e-mail, Pat Arensberg said he recently grew a strong devotion to Father Damien.

"He is a model for any priest, whether living in a parish or in a foreign mission country because of his devotion to the Lord and to the people he served," he said.

Just seven hours before Sunday's 10 a.m. (10 p.m. Saturday HST) canonization ceremony and Mass in Rome, Arensberg and Oahu resident Rheo Ofalsa were selected to serve as assistants to the pope during the canonization of five saints including Damien.

Arensberg's primary duty was to ensure that the microphone was placed correctly in front of the pope whenever he was to speak or pray.

"To have the opportunity to serve at the canonization was a real blessing," Arensberg said. "The whole event was very surreal, I couldn't believe I was in arm's distance from the pope the entire Mass."

The Arensbergs contacted family and friends on Maui as soon as they learned of their son's role. They also stayed up early Sunday morning in Mobile to watch the live telecast.

"We were so excited,"Julie Arensberg said about watching her son at the canonization. "We're just overwhelmed."

Joe Arensberg said he was proud of his son and happy about his choice to study for the priesthood.

"I was always hoping one of mine would choose a life of vocations," Arensberg said.

Joe Arensberg worked on Maui as paramedic but left the job nearly 20 years ago to study to be a teacher. He now teaches theology at a high school in Mobile, where he intends to share stories of Hawaii and of Father Damien.

"He was always one of those people local Hawaii Catholics could look up at," he said.

Pat Arensberg called it a blessing to be at Damien's canonization.

"I think that is is a great thing for Hawaii to get its first saint," he said. "Hopefully, it will be a call for a deeper relationship with Christ for all Christians, especially Catholics, that live in Hawaii.

"May they learn from the example of Father Damien: To love all our brothers and sisters as Christ did and to help those who are in need, no matter how dire the situation may be."

"Leprosy patients to see 1800s priest canonized"

From AP

By AUDREY McAVOY

HONOLULU — Most need wheelchairs. Their average age is 80.

Neither fact is stopping 11 elderly Hawaii leprosy patients from traveling 12,000 miles to the Vatican next month to watch as the Catholic Church canonizes Father Damien — a priest who cared for leprosy patients throughout the islands more than a century ago before dying of the disease himself.

Damien, who was born in Belgium as Joseph de Veuster, remains a beloved figure among many in Hawaii. In the 1870s, the leprosy patients Damien cared for were shunned by most people, even doctors, because of an intense stigma that was associated with the disease.

Today's patients from Kalaupapa, the isolated peninsula where Hawaii's leprosy patients were banished for more than 100 years, feel particularly close to Damien.

Dr. Kalani Brady, their physician, said Thursday the trip to Rome will be an "energy-laden" voyage for many of his patients.

"They're going to see their personal saint canonized," said Brady, 53, who will accompany the group to Rome. It's "incredibly important, incredibly personal for them," he said.

The reverence for Damien transcends religious sects, Brady said, noting that one 84-year-old making the trip is Mormon.

"He's bound to a wheelchair, he's completely blind. So it's important enough for him to go, despite the hurdles which he has to overcome," Brady said.

The Catholic Church announced earlier this year that it would make Damien a saint after determining a Hawaii woman was cured of terminal cancer after she prayed to Damien and he interceded on her behalf. The church found there was no medical explanation for the woman's recovery.

Pope Benedict XVI is due to preside over Damien's canonization on Oct. 11. Damien was beatified — a step toward sainthood — in 1995 by Pope John Paul II.

The pope is expected to meet privately with the patients during their stay in Rome.

The 11 are among about 20 patients who still live at Kalaupapa. The Kingdom of Hawaii began banishing leprosy patients to the remote section of Molokai island in the 1860s to control an outbreak of the disease that was killing Native Hawaiians in large numbers.

Many Hawaiians had no natural immunity to leprosy, as well as other diseases that led the Hawaiian population to shrink 70 percent in the seven decades after Captain James Cook, the first European to visit the islands, arrived in 1778.

Some 90 percent of the 8,000 people exiled to Kalaupapa were Native Hawaiians.

Successive governments continued to exile patients to Kalaupapa for over a century through 1969, when the state of Hawaii finally stopped the practice more than two decades after the discovery of drugs that could treat the disease.

Many patients chose to stay at Kalaupapa even after the medical isolation order was lifted because the community had become their home.

Today, many patients still have to fight the indignity of stereotypes and misperceptions about the illness.

Leprosy, also known as Hansen's disease, is spread by direct person-to-person contact, although it's not easily transmitted. It can cause skin lesions and lead to blindness.

But it's been curable since the development of sulfone drugs in the 1940s, and people treated with drugs aren't contagious.

Damien built homes for the sick, changed their bandages and ate poi, a Hawaiian staple, from the same bowl as the patients. He put up no barriers between himself and those he ministered to.

He was diagnosed with leprosy 12 years after he arrived and died five years later in 1889.

Overall, some 650 people from Hawaii are traveling to Rome for the canonization. Most, between 520 and 550, are expected to be part of the Catholic Diocese of Honolulu's delegation.

Those going also include a Boy Scout troop and Lt. Gov. James R. "Duke" Aiona.

Some will visit Belgium, including the town of Tremelo, where Damien was born, and Leuven, where his body was buried in 1936.

Damien still has a grave at Kalaupapa, but it now only contains a relic of his right hand.

Blessed Damien of Molokai to be Canonized on October 11

From an Associated Press article:

VATICAN CITY (AP) — A 19th-century Belgian priest who ministered to leprosy patients in Hawaii, and died of the disease, will be declared a saint this year at a Vatican ceremony presided over by Pope Benedict XVI.

The Rev. Damien de Veuster's canonization date of Oct. 11 was set Saturday.

Born Joseph de Veuster in 1840, he took the name Damien and went to Hawaii in 1864 to join other missionaries of the Congregation of the Sacred Hearts of Jesus and Mary. Nine years later, he began ministering to leprosy patients on the remote Kalaupapa peninsula of Molokai island, where some 8,000 people had been banished amid an epidemic in Hawaii in the 1850s.

The priest eventually contracted the disease, also known as Hansen's disease, and died in 1889 at age 49.

"He went there (to Hawaii) knowing that he could never return," The Rev. Alfred Bell, who spearheaded Damien's canonization cause, told Vatican Radio. "He suffered a lot, but he stayed."

De Veuster was beatified — a step toward sainthood — in 1995 by Pope John Paul II.

The Vatican's saint-making procedures require that a miracle attributed to the candidate's intercession be confirmed in order for him or her to be beatified. De Veuster was beatified after the Vatican declared that the 1987 recovery of a nun of the Sacred Hearts of Jesus and Mary was a miracle. The nun recovered after praying to Damien.

After beatification, a second miracle is needed for sainthood.

In July, Benedict declared that a Honolulu woman's recovery in 1999 from terminal lung cancer was the miracle needed for de Veuster to be made a saint.

The Vatican's Congregation for the Causes of Saints said Audrey Toguchi's 1999 recovery from lung cancer defied medical explanation. Toguchi, too, had prayed to Damien.

The Vatican announced the date for Damien's canonization and that of nine others. Five will be declared saints at a ceremony April 26, with the rest, including Damien, on Oct. 11.

Bell said Damien's concern for others was a model for all the faithful today, particularly the young.

"Father Damien's example helps us to not forget those who are forgettable in the world," he said.

"English nun who hid Jews from Nazis could become a saint"

From the Daily Mail

By Simon Caldwell

Photo at left: Mother Ricarda Beauchamp Hambrough let Jews hide in the Casa di San Brigida convent in Rome during the Second World War

A little-known English nun who helped to hide Italian Jews from the Nazis in wartime Rome is being considered as a possible saint.

Mother Ricarda Beauchamp Hambrough is credited with playing a vital role in saving the lives of more than 60 Jews by smuggling them into her convent.

The Bridgettines, the order to which she belonged, have now applied to the Vatican for permission to open her cause for sainthood.

If granted she will become one of four British women whose sainthood cases are under consideration by the Church.

The early stages of her cause will involve the examination of her life for evidence of ‘heroic virtue’, before two miracles will be sought to confirm her saintly status.

But if it progresses swiftly, she could become the first British woman saint since 1970 when Pope Paul VI canonised three women among 40 English and Welsh saints who died as martyrs in the Protestant Reformation.

Mother Ricarda was born Madaleina Catherine in London on 10 September 1887 and was received into the Roman Catholic Church in Brighton when she was four years old after her Anglican parents, Windsor and Louise, converted to the faith.

Little is known about her childhood but as a young woman she fell under the influence of Father Benedict Williamson, a London-based Benedictine monk, and in 1912, at the age of 24, she travelled to Rome to become a nun.

She was following in the footsteps of a group of three other English girls who had set out a year earlier wanting to join the Bridgettines, a 14th century order which had all but died out until it was re-established in 1911 by Blessed Mary Elizabeth Hasselblad, a Swedish convert from Lutheranism.

She took the religious name Ricarda and was soon chosen as the assistant to Blessed Mary Elizabeth, the abbess.

In the following decades she was at her superior’s side as the order won canonical approval from the Pope and, attracting a large number of vocations, began to open religious houses in Sweden, England, India and Italy.

The order also secured a mother house in Piazza Farnese in historic Rome, a grand building standing on the site of the house of the order’s original founder, St Bridget, a patron saint of Europe.

But within years of moving into new home war broke out and the activities of Mother Ricarda and her fellow nuns were soon concentrated on helping the victims of the conflict.

Pope Pius XII secretly ordered the religious houses of Rome to shelter Jews after the Gestapo seized 1,007 Jews during a sweep of the city on 16 October 1943.

He had protested vigorously to the Germans about the round-up but none of those arrested was released.

Mother Ricarda and Mother Mary Elizabeth then willingly gave refuge to scores of Italian Jews, Communists and Poles fleeing in terror from the Nazis.

A source within the Bridgettines has confirmed that Mother Ricarda was at the heart of the enterprise in hiding refugees.

She said: ‘We were helping many Jewish people during the war and Mother Ricarda was helping Mother Elizabeth to hide them.’

Mother Ricarda’s efforts to save Jewish lives is bound to feature strongly in persuading the Vatican that she is a saint – as it was also a factor in her abbess’s own swift elevation to beatification.

This was apparent when Pope John Paul II beatified Blessed Mary Elizabeth in 1999, noting in his homily the ‘care and concern’ Ricarda’s former boss had shown to ‘the persecuted Jewish people’ and ‘those who suffered because of racial laws’.

A year after the war, the Chief Rabbi of Rome, Israel Zolli, a friend of both Ricarda and Blessed Mary Elizabeth, converted to the Catholic faith – partly because he was so impressed by the efforts of Catholics to save Jewish lives. He took as his Christian name Eugenio – after the Pope Pius, the previous Eugenio Pacelli.

Pope Pius was severely criticised after his death for not speaking out directly against the Holocaust, but he was convinced this would have backfired both against the Jews and Church.
However, his policy of opening up the churches to those fleeing persecution was that an estimated 85 per cent of Roman Jews were able to escape the Nazis.

Blessed Mary Elizabeth died in 1957, and Mother Ricarda succeeded her as abbess until her own death on 26 June 1966 at the age of 79.

The pair are buried in the same grave in the convent church where they hid so many people from persecution.

Once the nuns have established that Mother Ricarda lived a life of heroic virtue the file on her life will be passed over to the Vatican.

Two miracles are then needed be fore she can be made a saint – the first for her beatification when she will be declared Blessed and the second for her ultimate canonisation.
A file is also being prepared on the cause for sainthood of Katherine Flanagan, a Londoner who joined the Bridgettines a year before Ricarda.

Father Ray Blake, the parish priest of St Mary Magdalen Church in Brighton, where Ricarda was baptised, said he was ‘terribly excited’ at the prospect of having a saint associated with his church.

"Saint Alphonsa Inspires Young Women To Become Nuns"

From UCA News

BHARANANGANAM, India (UCAN) -- Women just entering the Franciscan Clarists and others confirming their life commitment say India's first woman saint inspired them to join Religious life.

The story of Saint Alphonsa of the Immaculate Conception "motivated me to join a convent," said Sister Helen, one of three Kenyan nuns who on Nov. 8 made their perpetual vows as full-fledged members of the saint's congregation.

At the same function, 98 Indian novices also received their Religious habit, a sign of their provisional entry into the congregation. The ceremonies took place in Bharananganam, the village in Kerala state where the saint spent her final years, 2,650 kilometers south of New Delhi.

Sister Helen told UCA News afterward that she had heard a lot about Saint Alphonsa, whom Pope Benedict XVI canonized on Oct. 12 at the Vatican. "I prayed to Saint Alphonsa to give me strength to emulate her life," the 24-year-old Religious added.

Sister Jacinta, another Kenyan nun, said she felt thrilled on making her final profession. "Saint Alphonsa inspired me to become a nun. In our country, only a few women join the convent. But here I found a large number of young women opting for Religious life."

More than 30,000 people attended the four-hour program, which began with a procession of novices and their parents from the saint's tomb inside a hilltop chapel to St. Mary's Church, 100 meters downhill.

Retired Bishop Joseph Pallikaparampil of Palai led the Mass, assisted by four other bishops and scores of priests.

Sister Sharon, one of the novices who received their habit, told UCA News she has prayed to Saint Alphonsa whenever she faced problems. "Saint Alphonsa taught us with her life to accept our sufferings as signs of God's love. I wanted to follow her steps as a nun," she added. Her family lives in Vijayawada, Andhra Pradesh state, 1,200 kilometers northeast of Bharananganam.

Sister Sharon's father Elvin Minj, a police officer, recalled encouraging his daughter when she expressed a desire to join Saint Alphonsa's congregation.

"We know about Saint Alphonsa and her life from our parish priest, who hails from Kerala. We are very happy today as we could visit her tomb and pray there," said Minj, who came with his wife and son to attend the event.

After receiving her Religious habit, Sister Theresa from Imphal in Manipur state, 3,880 kilometers northeast of Bharananganam, told UCA News she wants to serve as a missioner and take the saint's message to more people. Saint Alphonsa, she pointed out, proved that prayer and penance can heal the world. "I want to tell more people about this, because the saint's message is more significant today," the young nun added.

According to the congregation's superior general, Sister Ceelia Mankuriyil, Saint Alphonsa's simple life and devotion to Jesus continues to draw many young women to her congregation, which started in Kerala in 1888 with eight members. Sister Alphonsa led a life full of misery and pain, but took all her pains as a mark of God's love toward her, the superior told UCA News.

Her congregation now has 6,783 members in 20 provinces around the globe -- in Austria, Germany, Kenya, Malawi, South Africa, Switzerland, Taiwan and the United States, besides India.

On Nov. 9, a day after the profession ceremonies, more than 100,000 people gathered around the saint's tomb to celebrate the canonization with a Mass and public meeting. Dignitaries included Cardinal Leonardo Sandri, prefect of the Vatican-based Congregation for Oriental Churches, and former Indian president A.P.J. Abdul Kalam.

Newly Canonized St. Alphonsa dedicated herself to Jesus at age 7

From The Times of India

VATICAN: Kerala nun Sister Alphonsa, who at the age of seven had dedicated herself to serving Jesus Christ, calling him "my divine Spouse", was greatly disturbed when her family decided to get her married at 13.

She prayed fervently and even contemplated disfiguring herself to escape the torment, according to a biography of her prepared by the Vatican ahead of her canonisation Sunday.

Following is the biography of Sister Alphonsa prepared by the Vatican:

"Blessed Alphonsa of the immaculate conception was born in Kudamalur, the Arpookara region, in the diocese of Changanacherry, India, on the 19th of August 1910, of the ancient and noble family of Muttathupadathu.

From her birth, the life of the Blessed was marked by the cross, which would be progressively revealed to her as the royal way to conform herself to Christ. Her mother, Maria Puthukari, gave birth to her prematurely, in her eight month of pregnancy, as a result of a fright she received when, during the sleep, a snake wrapped itself around her waist. Eight days later, the 28 of August, the child was baptised according to the Syro-Malabar rite by the Fr. Joseph Chackalayil, and she received the name Annakutty, a diminutive of Anne. She was the last of five children.

Her mother died three months later. Annakutty passed her early infancy in the home of her grandparents in Elumparambil. There she lived a particularly happy time because of her human and Christian formation, during which the first seeds of a vocation flowered. Her grand-mother, a pious and charitable woman, communicated the joy of the faith, love for prayer and a surge of charity towards the poor to her. At five years of age the child already knew how to lead, with a totally childish enthusiasm, the evening prayer of the family gathered, in accordance with the Syro-Malabar custom, in the "prayer room".

Annakutty received the Eucharistic bread for the first time on the 11 of November 1917. She used to say to her friends: "Do you know why I am so particularly happy today? It is because I have Jesus in my heart!” In a letter to her spiritual father, on the 30 of November 1943, she confided the following: "Already from the age of seven I was no longer mine. I was totally dedicated to my divine Spouse. Your reverence knows it well".

In the same year of 1917 she began to attend the elementary school of Thonnankuzhy, where she also established a sincere friendship with the Hindu children. When the first school cycle ended in 1920, the time had come to transfer to Muttuchira, to the house of her aunt Anna Murickal, to whom her mother, before she died, had entrusted her as her adoptive mother.

Her aunt was a severe and demanding woman, at times despotic and violent in demanding obedience from Annakutty in her every minimal disposition or desire. Assiduous in her religious practice, she accompanied her niece, but did not share the young girl's friendship with the Carmelites of the close-by Monastery or her long periods of prayer at the foot of the altar. She was, in fact, determined to procure an advantageous marriage for Annakutty, obstructing the clear signs of her religious vocation.

The virtue of the Blessed was manifested in accepting this severe and rigid education as a path of humility and patience for the love of Christ, and tenaciously resisted the reiterated attempts at engagement to which the aunt tried to oblige her. Annakutty, in order to get out from under a commitment to marriage, reached the point of voluntarily causing herself a grave burn by putting her foot into a heap of burning embers. "My marriage was arranged when I was thirteen years old. What had I to do to avoid it? I prayed all that night... then an idea came tome. If my body were a little disfigured no one would want me! ... O, how I suffered! I offered all for my great intention".

The proposal to defile her singular beauty did not fully succeed in freeing her from the attentions of suitors. During the following years the Blessed had to defend her vocation, even during the year of probation when an attempt to give her in marriage, with the complicity of the Mistress of Formation herself, was made. "O, the vocation which I received! A gift of my good God!.... God saw the pain of my soul in those days. God distanced the difficulties and established me in this religious state".

It was Fr. James Muricken, her confessor, who directed her towards Franciscan spirituality and put her in contact with the Congregation of the Franciscan Clarists. Annakutty entered their college in Bharananganam in the diocese of Palai, to attend seventh class, as an intern student, on the 24th of May 1927. The following year, on the 2nd of August 1928, Annakutty began her postulancy, taking the name of Alphonsa of the Immaculate Conception in honour of St. Alphonsus Liguori, whose feast it was that day. She was clothed in the religious habit on the 19th of May 1930, during the first pastoral visit made to Bharananganam by the Bishop, Msgr. James Kalacherry.

The period 1930-1935 was characterised by grave illness and moral suffering. She could teach the children in the school at Vakakkad only during the scholastic year 1932. Then, because of her weakness, she carried out the duties of assistant-teacher and catechist in the parish. She was engaged also as secretary, especially to write official letters because of her beautiful script.

The canonical novitiate was introduced into the Congregation of the Franciscan Clarists in 1934. Though wishing to enter immediately, the Blessed was only admitted on the 12th of August 1935 because of her ill health. About one week after the beginning of her novitiate, she had a haemorrhage from the nose and eyes and a profound organic wasting and purulent wounds on her legs. The illness deteriorated, to such a point that the worst was feared.

Heaven came to the rescue of the holy novice. During a novena to The Servant of God Fr. Kuriakose Elia Chavara - a Carmelite who today is a Blessed-she wasmiraculously and instantaneously cured.

Having restarted her novitiate, she wrote the following proposals in her spiritual diary: "I do not wish to act or speak according to my inclinations. Every time I fail, I will do penance... I want to be careful never to reject anyone. I will only speak sweet words to others. I want to control my eyes with rigour. I will ask pardon of the Lord for every little failure and I will atone for it through penance. No matter what my sufferings may be, I will never complain and if I have to undergo any humiliation, I will seek refuge in the Sacred Heart of Jesus".

The 12th of August 1936, the feast of St. Clare, the day of her perpetual profession, was a day of inexpressible spiritual joy. She had realised her desire, guarded for a long time in her heart and confided to her sister Elizabeth when she was only 12 years old: "Jesus is my only Spouse, and none other".

Jesus, however, wished to lead His spouse to perfection through a life of suffering. "I made my perpetual profession on the 12th of August 1936 and came here to Bharanganam on the following 14th. From that time, it seems, I was entrusted with a part of the cross of Christ. There are abundant occasions of suffering... I have a great desire to suffer with joy. It seems that my Spouse wishes to fulfil this desire".

Painful illnesses followed each other: typhoid fever, double pneumonia, and, the most serious of all, a dramatic nervous shock, the result of a fright on seeing a thief during the night of the 18th of October 1940. Her state of psychic incapacity lasted for about a year, during which she was unable to read or write.

In every situation, Sister Alphonsa always maintained a great reservation and charitable attitude towards the Sisters, silently undergoing her sufferings. In 1945 she had a violent outbreak of illness. A tumour, which had spread throughout her organs, transformed her final year of life into a continuous agony. Gastroenteritis and liver problems caused violent convulsions and vomiting up to forty times a day: "I feel that the Lord has destined me to be an oblation, a sacrifice of suffering... I consider a day in which I have not suffered as a day lost to me".

With this attitude of a victim for the love of the Lord, happy until the final moment and with a smile of innocence always on her lips, Sister Alphonsa quietly and joyfully brought her earthly journey to a close in the convent of the Franciscan Clarists at Bharananganam at 12.30 on the 28th July 1946, leaving behind the memory of a Sister full of love and a saint.

Alphonsa of the Immaculate Conception Muttathupadathu was proclaimed blessed by Pope John Paul II in Kottayam, India, on the 8th of February 1986.

With today's Canonisation, the Church in India presents its first Saint to the veneration of the faithful of the whole world. Faithful from every part of the world have come together in a single act of thanksgiving to God in her name and in a sign of the great oriental and western traditions, Roman and Malabar, which Sr. Alphonsa lived and harmonised in her saintly life.

Feast of St. John Mary Vianney - Model of the Diocesan Priesthood

From Catholic News Agency

Saint of the Day - August 04, 2008

St. John Mary Vianney

"We cannot comprehend the power that a pure soul has over God. It is not the soul that does God's will, but God who does the soul's will." -- Saint John Vianney.

Born May 8, 1786 in Dardilly, near Lyon, in a family of farmers, Jean-Marie Vianney started preparing his priesthood when he was 20 with Father Balley, priest of Ecully. He was ordained in 1815 and became Curate in Ecully. He was then sent to Ars in 1818. As soon as he arrived, he made the church his home. Night and day, there he was, in front of the tabernacle, praying the Lord for his parishioners'conversion. Little by little, he revived their faith through his sermons but above all through his prayers and his lifestyle. He restored and embellished his church, formed an orphanage : « La Providence » and took care of the poor. Very quickly, his reputation as a confessor drew to him many pilgrims seeking the pardon of God and the peace of heart.

Assailed by many fights and ordeals he kept his heart rooted in the love of God and his brothers ; his only concern was the salvation of the souls. His catechisms and his homelies mainly dealt with the goodness and mercy of God. This priest burning with love before the Blessed Sacrament, entirely devoted to God, to his parishioners and to the pilgrims, died August 4,1859, after having reached the limite of Love.

He practised mortification from his early youth and for forty years his food and sleep were insufficient, humanly speaking, to sustain life. And yet he laboured incessantly, with unfailing humility, gentleness, patience, and cheerfulness, until he was more than seventy-three years old.

On 3 October, 1874 Jean-Baptiste-Marie Vianney was proclaimed Venerable by Pius IX and on 8 January, 1905, he was enrolled among the Blessed. Pope Pius X proposed him as a model to the parochial clergy.

In 1925, Pope Pius XI canonized him. His feast is kept on 4 August.

Miracle Attributed to St. Thérèse's Parents and Blessed Damian of Molokai

From ZENIT

VATICAN CITY, JULY 3, 2008 (Zenit.org).- Benedict XVI authorized the promulgation of decrees attributing miracles to five causes, including that of Louis and Marie-Celie Martin, parents of St. Thérèse (and Bl. Damian of Molokai!).

The Pope received in private audience today Cardinal José Saraiva Martins, prefect of the Congregation for Saints' Causes. The Holy Father authorized the promulgation of decrees concerning the following causes:

Miracles were attributed to:

-- Blessed, Father Damian de Veuster, Belgian professed priest of the Congregation of the Sacred Hearts of Jesus and Mary (1840-1889). (Blessed Father Damian is perhaps one of the more heroic stories of a priest sacrificing everything in order to bring the sacraments and care to the truly outcast and marginalized of society. If you have never seen the movie Molokai, you should do so. It is a very well made film and does a wonderful job of illustrating the life of this incredible priest. I've posted it in the "bookstore" permanently, put will post a link below as well.)

-- Blessed Bernardo Tolomei, Italian founder of the Olivetan Benedictine Congregation (1272-1348).

-- Blessed Nuño di Santa Maria Álvares Pereira, Portuguese professed layman of the Order of Friars of the Blessed Virgin Mary of Mount Carmel (1360-1431). A decree recognizing his heroic virtue was also approved.

-- Servant of God Louis Martin, French layman (1823-1894) and Servant of God Marie-Zélie Guerin Martin, French laywoman (1831-1877). (Parents of St. Therese of Lisieux and her four sisters who also entered religious - if canonized they could certainly be the patron saints of married couples and exemplary models of parents promoting discernment amongst their children.)

--Italian Servant of God Francesco Giovanni Bonifacio (1912-1946), killed because of hatred of the faith at Villa Gardossi, Italy, was recognized as a martyr.

And seven more people were recognized as having lived lives of heroic virtue:

-- Stephen Douayhy, Lebanese patriarch of Antioch of the Maronites (1630-1704).

-- Bernardino Dal Vago da Portogruaro (born Giuseppe), Italian archbishop of the Order of Friars Minor (1822-1895).

-- Giuseppe Di Donna, Italian bishop of Andria, of the Order of the Blessed Trinity (1901-1952).

- Maria Barbara of the Blessed Trinity Maix (born Barbara), Austrian founder of the Sisters of the Immaculate Heart of Mary (1818-1873).

-- Pius Keller (born Hans), German professed priest of the Order of St. Augustine (1825-1904).

-- Andrés Hibernón Garmendia (born Francisco Andres), Spanish professed brother of the Institute of Brothers of Christian Schools (1880- 1969).

-- Chiara Badano, young Italian lay woman (1971-1990).

"Saints be praised, holy bones hit road"

This is the second time I've come across the fact that Passionists are bringing out relics of their Saints for veneration - and for promotion of vocations to their community. Wonderful!

From The Age.com
Carolyn Webb
May 9, 2008

Father Tiernan Doherty is taking relics around the country.
Photo: John Woudstra

He's not a rock star; he's a Catholic priest from the little-known Passionist Order, but like Jimmy Barnes, his aim is to inspire veneration.

In the lead-up to World Youth Day in Sydney on July 15, Father Doherty will chaperone the relics — slivers of bone — of three saints.

They've been sent to Canberra from the Basilica of St John and St Paul in Rome. Yesterday Father Doherty drove them to Melbourne and handed them to Father John Pearce, the Passionists' Australian head, at the Kew office of tour sponsor Le Pine Funerals.

They will "stay" at the Passionists' Holy Cross monastery in Templestowe until the tour of NSW, Victoria and South Australia next month.

All three of the saints were Italian. Like rock stars, they all died young.

Gabriel Possenti was 23 when he died of tuberculosis in 1862 while studying to be a Passionist priest. He was adopted long after his death by the US gun lobby, which claims his firearm skills saved a village from marauders in 1860.

But Father Pearce, of St Paul Apostle in Endeavour Hills, says this is a fable. He had been a hunter, but guns were common in Italian villages to shoot pigs.

Maria Goretti died horribly — in 1902, age 11, she was attacked by an intruder who tried to rape her, and then stabbed her to death when she said she'd rather die than submit.

St Gemma Galgani died aged 25 in 1903. She had suffered meningitis, cared for her seven siblings when their parents died, and developed stigmata-like gashes in her hands, feet and heart. She died of tuberculosis.

The itinerary for the metre-long closed reliquary includes a service on June 10 St Paul Apostle in Endeavour Hills; a 7pm mass at St Bernadette's in Sunshine; a sitting at the Holy Cross Monastery, Templestowe, on June 14, and St Brendan's in Shepparton on June 25 and 26.