Acquiring Peace and Zeal for Perfection [1]

WE SHOULD enjoy much peace if we did not concern ourselves with what
others say and do, for these are no concern of ours. How can a man who
meddles in affairs not his own, who seeks strange distractions, and
who is little or seldom inwardly recollected, live long in peace?
Blessed are the simple of heart for they shall enjoy peace in
abundance.
--Thomas à Kempis, From the Imitation of Christ--Book 1 Chapter 11

<<>><<>><<>>
April 28th - Saint Louis Mary de Montfort

d. 1716
Born: Jan 31. 1673 Canonized: 1947 by Pope Pius XII He was born poor.
Studied in Paris, and ordained in 1700. While a seminarian he
delighted in researching the writings of Church Fathers, Doctors, and
Saints as they related to the Blessed Virgin Mary, to whom he was
singularly devoted.

ST. Louis Mary was the eldest of the eight children of John Baptist
Grignion, and was born in modest circumstances at Montfort, then in
the diocese of Saint-Malo, in 1673. After being educated at the Jesuit
college in Rennes, he went at the age of twenty to Paris to prepare
for the priesthood; but being unable through poverty to gain
admittance to the seminary of Saint-Sulpice, he entered a small
institution conducted by the Abbé de la Barmondière. At the abbé’s
death he moved to a still more Spartan establishment: real penury
reigned, and the wretched food was cooked by the students, who all in
turn “had the pleasure of poisoning themselves”, as one of them
afterwards ironically observed. Louis himself fell so dangerously ill
that he had to be removed to the hospital. When at last he recovered,
it was made possible for him to enter Saint-Sulpice to complete his
religious course. We find him selected as one of the two exemplary
students who were annually sent on pilgrimage to one of our Lady’s
shrines, on this occasion Chartres.

His success while still a seminarian in giving catechetical
instruction to the roughest and most undisciplined children in Paris,
confirmed Louis Grignion in the desire to undertake apostolic work.
Therefore, after his ordination in 1700, he spent a short time at
Nantes with a priest, who trained men for home missions, before
proceeding to Poitiers, where he was appointed chaplain to the
hospital. In this institution for nursing the sick poor he soon
produced a much-needed reformation, and organized from amongst the
female staff and residents the nucleus of the congregation of
Daughters of the Divine Wisdom, for whom he compiled a rule.
Nevertheless the very improvements he introduced aroused resentment,
and he was obliged to resign his post. At once he began to give
missions to the poor, who flocked to hear him, but the bishop of
Poitiers, at the instigation of the critics of Father Grignion,
forbade him to preach in his diocese. Undismayed, he set off on foot
for Rome to seek authority from Pope Clement XI, who received him
encouragingly and sent him back to France with the title of missionary apostolic. As Poitiers remained closed to him, he returned to his
native Brittany, where he embarked on a course of missions which he
continued almost uninterruptedly until his death
.
Although the majority of parishes received St Louis Mary with open
arms, adverse criticism continued to dog his steps, and he found
himself excluded from certain churches and even dioceses by
ecclesiastics of Jansenist proclivities. Moreover, his methods
sometimes startled the conventional. He would invite his audience to
bring their irreligious books to be burnt on a great pyre surmounted
by an effigy of the Devil represented as a society-woman; or he would
himself realistically act the part of a dying sinner whose soul was
being contended for by the Devil and his guardian angel, impersonated
by two other priests standing beside his prostrate form. But, if he
seemed to appeal to the emotions, the response he elicited was
frequently practical and lasting. It often expressed itself in the
restoration of some dilapidated church, in the setting up of huge
memorial crosses, in liberal alms to the poor and in a real spiritual
revival. Nearly sixty years after the holy man’s death, the curé of
Saint-La declared that many of his parishioners still practised the
devotions Louis had inculcated in one of his missions. The first and
foremost of these was the rosary, for the recitation of which he
established numerous confraternities. Then there were hymns or
metrical prayers of his own composition, many of which are sung to
this day in parts of France. It seems to have been his great love for
the rosary which led him to become a tertiary of the order of St
Dominic.

But St Louis did not confine his evangelistic efforts to his
missions—he believed in preaching the word of God in season and out of season. On one occasion, when travelling on a market-boat between
Rouen and Dinant, he asked his fellow passengers, who were singing
obscene songs, to join him in the rosary. Twice they answered his
invitation with jeers, but eventually they not only recited it
reverently on their knees, but also listened attentively to the homily
with which he followed it. Another day-it was a rough alfresco dance
which he brought to an end in the same way. Perhaps his greatest
triumphs were won in the Calvinistic stronghold of La Rochelle, where
he held several crowded missions in rapid succession, and reconciled a
number of Protestants to the Church. St Louis had long desired to form
an association of missionary priests, but it was only a few years
before his death that he succeeded in attaching to himself a few
ordained men who became the first Missionaries of the Company of Mary.
He was in the midst of a mission at Saint-Laurent-sur-Sèvre when he
was attacked by a sudden illness which proved fatal. He was only
forty-three years of age when he died in 1716.

Apart from his verses and hymns, St Louis Mary Grignion’s chief
literary work was the well-known treatise on “True Devotion to the
Blessed Virgin”, in which a renewal of interest was caused by his canonization in 1947.

Leaving out of account earlier biographies, such as those of the
contemporary J. Grandet and of P. de Clorivière (1775), special
mention must be made of A. Laveille’s Le b,. L.-M. Grignion de
Montfort d’après des documents inédits (1907); but there are many
other Lives in French....


Saint Quote:
"Learn, my Sisters, to suffer something for the love of God, without
letting everyone know it"
--St. Teresa

 On a Good Friday, the venerable Father Daponte asked Our Lord the
favor of giving him a share in His sufferings. He answered by sending
him fearful pains for the rest of his life, which he received with the
greatest possible joy. Once being asked how he felt, he replied: "Oh,
how well God chastises this sinner! I tell you that except my head, no
part of my body is without its own particular pain." A little while
after, he repented of having said so much and made a vow never to
reveal his sufferings to anyone, when he could conceal them without
displeasing God.

(Taken from the book "A Year with the Saints".  April -- Patience)

Bible Quote
16 So let your light shine before men, that they may see your good
works, and glorify your Father who is in heaven. 17 Do not think that
I am come to destroy the law, or the prophets. I am not come to
destroy, but to fulfill.  (Matthew 5:16-17) DRB


<><><><>
Short Prayers

Let not the partaking of Thy Body, O Lord Jesus Christ, which
I, all unworthy, presume to receive, turn to my judgment and
condemnation, but through Thy loving kindness may it be to
me a safeguard and remedy for soul and body. Who livest
and reignest world without end. Amen.

Lord, I am not worthy that Thou shouldst enter under my roof;
but only say the word, and my soul shall be healed.

The cross is my sure salvation.
The cross I ever adore.
The cross of the Lord is with me.
The cross is my refuge.

--- SoupGate-Win32 v1.05
* Origin: fsxNet Usenet Gateway (21:1/5)