Saint Of The Day Sunday 14th May 2023
ST MATTHIAS THE APOSTLE
&
ST. MICHAEL GARICOÏTS, PRIEST, FOUNDER OF PRIESTS OF THE SACRED HEART OF JESUS OF BÉTHARRAM
St. Matthias, (flourished 1st century CE, Judaea—died, traditionally Colchis, Armenia; Western feast day February 24, Eastern feast day August 9), in the New Testament, among the 12 Apostles, the disciple who, according to Acts of the Apostles 1:21–26, was chosen to replace Judas Iscariot after Judas betrayed Jesus.
Jesus’ choice of 12 Apostles points to a consciousness of a symbolic mission—originally there were 12 tribes of Israel—that the community maintained after the Crucifixion. Acts reveals that Matthias accompanied Jesus and the Apostles from the time of the baptism of Jesus to the Ascension and that, when it became time to replace Judas, the Apostles cast lots between Matthias and another candidate, St. Joseph Barsabbas. St. Jerome and the early Christian writers St. Clement of Alexandria and Eusebius of Caesarea attest that Matthias was among the 72 disciples paired off and dispatched by Jesus. Soon after his election, Matthias received the Holy Spirit with the other Apostles (Acts 2:1–4). He is not mentioned again in the New Testament.
It is generally believed that Matthias ministered in Judaea and then carried out missions to foreign places. Greek tradition states that he Christianized Cappadocia, a mountainous district now in central Turkey, and later journeyed to the region about the Caspian Sea, where he was martyred by crucifixion and, according to other legends, chopped apart. His symbol, related to his alleged martyrdom, is either a cross or a halberd. St. Helena, mother of the Roman emperor Constantine the Great, reputedly transported Matthias’s relics from Jerusalem to Rome.
From other source: CNA
Matthias, whose name means “gift of God”, was the disciple chosen to replace Judas as one of the twelve Apostles. The Acts of the Apostles state that he was also one of the 72 disciples that the Lord Jesus sent out to preach the good news. Matthias was with the Lord since His Baptism, and was “a witness to Christ’s Resurrection,” according to St. Peter in Acts. He remained with Jesus until His Ascension.
According to various traditions, Matthias preached in Cappadocia, Jerusalem, the shores of the Caspian Sea (in modern day Turkey) and Ethiopia. He is said to have met his death by crucifixion in Colchis or by stoning in Jerusalem.
There is evidence cited in some of the early Church fathers that there was a Gospel according to Matthias in circulation, but it has since been lost, and was declared apocryphal by Pope Gelasius.
He is invoked for assistance against alcoholism, and for support by recovered alcoholics.
Saint Michael Garicoits
Founder (1797-1863)
Saint Michael Garicoits was born in 1797 on a small farm in the south of France, near the town of Ibarre, not far from Lourdes and from Betharram, an ancient pilgrimage site. Later the mother house of the Congregation which he founded, the Priests of the Sacred Heart of Betharram, was established at that site.
He was ordained a priest at Bayonne in 1823, and spent two years as Assistant in the parish of Cambo, where he established the devotion and confraternity of the Sacred Heart. He was summoned to the Major Seminary of Betharram to serve as a professor of philosophy and theology in 1825, and he became Superior there in 1831.
In 1832 he made a retreat based on the Spiritual Exercises of Saint Ignatius, which strengthened in him his desire to found a new Society of Priests, a desire confirmed by his superiors' approbation. He had been greatly impressed by the poverty he had seen practiced by a holy Foundress of a Congregation of Sisters, herself compared to Saint Teresa of Avila, who during her lifetime saw 99 houses of her Congregation established in several countries. Saint Michael desired the same practice of poverty for his priests, as he had seen instituted under the direction of Saint Elizabeth Bichier des Ages, who founded the Daughters of the Cross, or Sisters of Saint Andrew. Saint Elizabeth was, by a singular disposition of Providence, later canonized the same day as Saint Michael. Both Saints taught the importance of the interior life as the unique and irreplaceable source of any serious apostolate.
In his early efforts as founder, the fervent priest was faced with the opposition of his bishop, who desired that the new Institute be placed more specifically under diocesan authority than under that of its religious Superiors. Saint Michael, devoted to the Will of God, the point of departure to attain sanctity, remained in submission for long years. In 1875, after a wholly supernatural intervention which occurred in the nearby Convent of Pau through the intermediary of the Arab Carmelite, Blessed Mary of Jesus Crucified, the Institute as he conceived it was approved in Rome under Leo XIII. This occurred after the holy Founder had already been called to his reward in 1863.
Miracles by the dozens had followed his death, and the Priests of the Sacred Heart of Betharram spread in the lands of South America, as well as in France, England and Italy, where they direct teaching activities.
At the canonization, Pius XII exhorted the religious of the Institute of the Sacred Heart and the Daughters of the Cross, present at the canonization of their respective Founders, to maintain the primitive spirit of their Congregations, saying: Be deaf to the temptation to sacrifice your religious life and personal sanctification to the apostolate. That would be similar to gathering beautiful flowers from a tree to form a bouquet, and afterwards wanting to find fruit on barren branches.
Nouvelle Revue théologique, Vol. 69, (December 1947; Un Saint basque, le bienheureux Michel Garicoïts, by Gaëtan Bernoville (J. de Gigord: Paris, 1936); Magnificat magazine, Vol. XXX, No. 6, June 1995 (Magnificat: St. Jovite).
This site was designed with Websites.co.in
Comments
Post a Comment