RADIO VATICANA REPORT: Pope
Benedict has sent a message to the 6th
Ordinary Meeting of the International Forum of Catholic Action, which began on
Thursday. This year’s Meeting is focusing on “Lay Catholic Action members:
ecclesial and social co-responsibility.”
“This responsibility requires a change in mentality concerning, in particular, the role of the laity in the Church,” Pope Benedict writes. “They should not be considered as merely ‘collaborators’ of the clergy, but as people truly ‘co-responsible’ in the work of the Church.”
The Holy Father says it is important that the laity be well-formed and capable of making “their own specific contribution to the mission of the Church, in accordance with the ministries and tasks in which each one takes part in the life of the Church, and always in an amicable communion with the Bishops.”
Pope Benedict encourages members of Catholic Action to announce the message of Christ in the language of our time, which has been marked by rapid social and cultural changes, calling this “the great challenge of the New Evangelization.”
SHARED FROM RADIO VATICANA
“This responsibility requires a change in mentality concerning, in particular, the role of the laity in the Church,” Pope Benedict writes. “They should not be considered as merely ‘collaborators’ of the clergy, but as people truly ‘co-responsible’ in the work of the Church.”
The Holy Father says it is important that the laity be well-formed and capable of making “their own specific contribution to the mission of the Church, in accordance with the ministries and tasks in which each one takes part in the life of the Church, and always in an amicable communion with the Bishops.”
Pope Benedict encourages members of Catholic Action to announce the message of Christ in the language of our time, which has been marked by rapid social and cultural changes, calling this “the great challenge of the New Evangelization.”
SHARED FROM RADIO VATICANA
WORLD : DONATE TO JCE NEWS NOW - WE NEED YOUR HELP
PLEASE DONATE NOW THANK-YOU. GOD BLESS.
http://jesuscaritasest.org
was established in 2009. We are read in over 200 countries worldwide. Its motto is "Jesus Caritas Est"; Jesus is love.
Consider becoming a monthly donor of $5
per month.
Dear Family in Christ. JCE news has provided you readers with breaking news stories on a daily basis. Every little bit helps; please consider making a one time donation or monthly donation of just $5. We need your help costs for Internet and Websites have drained financial accounts; we need your help to continue bringing vital news around the globe. With your contribution you become part of the JCE team and help bring the Catholic, Pro-life, Pro-family issues to light.
WE
NEED YOUR HELP DONATE NOW VIA PAYPAL
Thank-you dear readers
for your support and God bless,
We are available AT-
LIKE US ON FACEBOOK: http://www.facebook.com/jesuscaritasestnews
WE
NEED YOUR HELP DONATE NOW VIA PAYPAL
AMERICA : RIP FR. VICTOR CAPRIOLO OF FOND DU LAC
 |
died in an car accident while riding a bicycle. Fr. Victor was pastor in Fond du Lac, Wisconsin. He was 67 years old. He was struck around 7:50pm while crossing a highway bypass.
Fr. Capriolo's Church website released the following:Holy Family Catholic Community clergy, staff and parishioners are deeply saddened to learn of the death of Fr. Vic Capriolo in a traffic accident on the evening of Wednesday, August 22. He was a compassionate pastor, dedicated to all he served in the archdiocese and beyond. We ask that his family and friends be kept in your prayers. Funeral information will be forthcoming when arrangements have been made. Please check our website, www.hffdl.org , for updates as they become available.
Funeral services for Fr. Vic will be visitation at Holy Family Church on Monday, August 27 from 2:00 - 7:00 pm with a vigil to follow at 7:00 pm in the church. Tuesday there will be more visitation at Holy Family Church from 9:00 - 11:00 am with the funeral to follow at 11:00 am at Holy Family Church. We thank everyone for the outpouring of sympathy and prayers at this difficult time.
ASIA : SYRIA : OVER 200000 REFUGEES IN NEIGHBOR COUNTRIES
ASIA NEWS REPORT:
United Nations commissioner updates refugee data. Many are underage or unaccompanied children. Turkey alone has 78,000 refugees, up from 44,000 at the end of July. As violence continues in Damascus and Aleppo, at least 70 were killed across the country in the past three days, 4,000 in the last three weeks.
Damascus (AsiaNews/Agencies) - The United Nations refugee agency said that more than 200,000 Syrian refugees have fled to neighbouring countries as the conflict intensified, this according to Adrian Edwards, a spokesman for the Office of the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR), who spoke at a press conference in Geneva.
The agency had anticipated a total of 185,000 registered refugees by the end of this year. With 30,000 more arriving in Turkey, Lebanon, Jordan and Iraq in the past seven days alone, the actual number is much higher. Many of them are under 18, including unaccompanied children.
In Damascus and Aleppo, fighting continues. Activists said Syrian army tanks reached the centre of the Damascus suburb of Darayya, after shelling killed about 20 people.
According to the UNHRC, the number of Internally Displaced People (IDPs) is 1.2 million. Another 2.5 million need humanitarian aid.
In Jordan, a record 2,200 people crossed the border overnight and were received at Zaatari camp in the north. In Lebanon, where some 51,000 Syrians have already found refuge, the fighting in Syria has spilled over, pitting Sunnis pro-Assad Alawis continue. In Iraq, schools near the border are overflowing just as children prepare to go back to school.
The largest contingent of refugees has fled to Turkey, which now hosts more than 78,000 Syrian refugees, according to the country's Disaster and Emergency Management Directorate, a sharp rise on the 44,000 registered there at the end of July.
Ankara, saying it will not be able to accommodate more than 100,000 refugees, has suggested that the United Nations set up a safe haven inside Syria to staunch the outflow.
The rising tide of refugees is directly related to the escalating violence of the summer months. In the past 72 hours, at least 70 people have been killed in Darayya, most of them civilians.
More than 90 people were killed across Syria on Friday, 220 since Thursday, the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights reported. In the past three weeks, the death toll topped 4,000.
Reports are coming in claiming that Assad's forces are handing out flyers encouraging people to flee to neighbouring countries, especially Turkey, to put pressure on the latter.
Despite the violent escalation, like every Friday since the start of the uprising in March 2012, Syrians took to the streets yesterday in opposition to the regime and outrage at the international community's failure to stop the bloodshed. In some places, people should, "We are disgusted by the world!
SHARED FROM ASIA NEWS
United Nations commissioner updates refugee data. Many are underage or unaccompanied children. Turkey alone has 78,000 refugees, up from 44,000 at the end of July. As violence continues in Damascus and Aleppo, at least 70 were killed across the country in the past three days, 4,000 in the last three weeks.
_0825_-_Number_of_refugees_rises_to_200000.jpg)
Damascus (AsiaNews/Agencies) - The United Nations refugee agency said that more than 200,000 Syrian refugees have fled to neighbouring countries as the conflict intensified, this according to Adrian Edwards, a spokesman for the Office of the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR), who spoke at a press conference in Geneva.
The agency had anticipated a total of 185,000 registered refugees by the end of this year. With 30,000 more arriving in Turkey, Lebanon, Jordan and Iraq in the past seven days alone, the actual number is much higher. Many of them are under 18, including unaccompanied children.
In Damascus and Aleppo, fighting continues. Activists said Syrian army tanks reached the centre of the Damascus suburb of Darayya, after shelling killed about 20 people.
According to the UNHRC, the number of Internally Displaced People (IDPs) is 1.2 million. Another 2.5 million need humanitarian aid.
In Jordan, a record 2,200 people crossed the border overnight and were received at Zaatari camp in the north. In Lebanon, where some 51,000 Syrians have already found refuge, the fighting in Syria has spilled over, pitting Sunnis pro-Assad Alawis continue. In Iraq, schools near the border are overflowing just as children prepare to go back to school.
The largest contingent of refugees has fled to Turkey, which now hosts more than 78,000 Syrian refugees, according to the country's Disaster and Emergency Management Directorate, a sharp rise on the 44,000 registered there at the end of July.
Ankara, saying it will not be able to accommodate more than 100,000 refugees, has suggested that the United Nations set up a safe haven inside Syria to staunch the outflow.
The rising tide of refugees is directly related to the escalating violence of the summer months. In the past 72 hours, at least 70 people have been killed in Darayya, most of them civilians.
More than 90 people were killed across Syria on Friday, 220 since Thursday, the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights reported. In the past three weeks, the death toll topped 4,000.
Reports are coming in claiming that Assad's forces are handing out flyers encouraging people to flee to neighbouring countries, especially Turkey, to put pressure on the latter.
Despite the violent escalation, like every Friday since the start of the uprising in March 2012, Syrians took to the streets yesterday in opposition to the regime and outrage at the international community's failure to stop the bloodshed. In some places, people should, "We are disgusted by the world!
SHARED FROM ASIA NEWS
AUSTRALIA : SISTER OF MERCY WINS ACHIEVEMENT AWARD
ARCHDIOCESE OF MELBOURNE REPORT:
WHEN
she trained as a Sister of Mercy in Ireland, Sr Angela Mary Doyle was preparing
for a life of teaching. Although on arriving in Australia and being thrust into
a health care role, her path changed – and has taken her to meetings with
royalty as well as religious and civic leaders.
Her enduring contribution to the Catholic health and aged care community in Australia was last night recognised when she became the third recipient of the Sr Maria Cunningham Lifetime Contribution Award, at the Catholic Health Australia awards dinner.
Fellow Mercy Sister Helen Monkivitch, the recipient of the award at last year’s CHA awards dinner, read the citiation outlining some of Sr Angela Mary’s many roles with the Mater Hospitals in Queensland.
After completing a diploma of nursing administration in 1964, she was appointed to a position that would be today's equivalent of the CEO of the Mater Hospitals. She served in that capacity for 22 years, also completing a bachelor of business during that period.
Sr Angela Mary later ran the Mater Hospital Trust, which has made a major contribution to the growth of Mater services around Australia, thanks in no small part to Sr Angela Mary making numerous phone calls to seek donations and support.
While in her own version of retirement, Sr Angela Mary continues to write books, conduct interviews and work for social justice. It’s a commitment that has always shaped her life and her way of thinking.
In the 1980s, for example, when many in society – including leading government officials – were shunning those with HIV/Aids, Sr Angela Mary led efforts to provide care to those men. She was named Queenslander of the Year in 1989 for that work.
“The Sisters of Mercy were founded for the poor, the sick and anyone disadvantaged. We knew our time had come to declare our hand,” Sr Angela Mary recalled in 2009, when she was inducted into the Queensland Business Leaders Hall of Fame.
Other civic recognitions she has received include the Queensland Premier’s inaugural Queensland Greats award in 2001. She was appointed to the Order of Australia in 1993 and has received honorary doctorates from the Queensland University of Technology and Griffith University.
Catholic Health Australia CEO Martin Laverty said the organisation has been able to recognise three “giants of Catholic health and aged care” since Sr Maria Cunningham was named the first recipient of the lifetime contribution award that bears her name.
“Sr Angela Mary is universally recognised as someone who deeply understands how Jesus cared for the sick, the poor and the marginalised and sees it as her role to continue that ministry in a contemporary setting,” Mr Laverty said.
“She, like Sr Maria and Sr Helen, is a remarkable role model for anyone involved in the provision of health, aged and community care.”
Photo courtesy of Catholic Health Australia
SHARED FROM ARCHDIOCESE OF MELBOURNE
WHEN
she trained as a Sister of Mercy in Ireland, Sr Angela Mary Doyle was preparing
for a life of teaching. Although on arriving in Australia and being thrust into
a health care role, her path changed – and has taken her to meetings with
royalty as well as religious and civic leaders.Her enduring contribution to the Catholic health and aged care community in Australia was last night recognised when she became the third recipient of the Sr Maria Cunningham Lifetime Contribution Award, at the Catholic Health Australia awards dinner.
Fellow Mercy Sister Helen Monkivitch, the recipient of the award at last year’s CHA awards dinner, read the citiation outlining some of Sr Angela Mary’s many roles with the Mater Hospitals in Queensland.
After completing a diploma of nursing administration in 1964, she was appointed to a position that would be today's equivalent of the CEO of the Mater Hospitals. She served in that capacity for 22 years, also completing a bachelor of business during that period.
Sr Angela Mary later ran the Mater Hospital Trust, which has made a major contribution to the growth of Mater services around Australia, thanks in no small part to Sr Angela Mary making numerous phone calls to seek donations and support.
While in her own version of retirement, Sr Angela Mary continues to write books, conduct interviews and work for social justice. It’s a commitment that has always shaped her life and her way of thinking.
In the 1980s, for example, when many in society – including leading government officials – were shunning those with HIV/Aids, Sr Angela Mary led efforts to provide care to those men. She was named Queenslander of the Year in 1989 for that work.
“The Sisters of Mercy were founded for the poor, the sick and anyone disadvantaged. We knew our time had come to declare our hand,” Sr Angela Mary recalled in 2009, when she was inducted into the Queensland Business Leaders Hall of Fame.
Other civic recognitions she has received include the Queensland Premier’s inaugural Queensland Greats award in 2001. She was appointed to the Order of Australia in 1993 and has received honorary doctorates from the Queensland University of Technology and Griffith University.
Catholic Health Australia CEO Martin Laverty said the organisation has been able to recognise three “giants of Catholic health and aged care” since Sr Maria Cunningham was named the first recipient of the lifetime contribution award that bears her name.
“Sr Angela Mary is universally recognised as someone who deeply understands how Jesus cared for the sick, the poor and the marginalised and sees it as her role to continue that ministry in a contemporary setting,” Mr Laverty said.
“She, like Sr Maria and Sr Helen, is a remarkable role model for anyone involved in the provision of health, aged and community care.”
Photo courtesy of Catholic Health Australia
SHARED FROM ARCHDIOCESE OF MELBOURNE
EUROPE : PRINCE HARRY - INDECENT EXPOSURE - DAMAGES MONARCHY
CATHOLIC HERALD REPORT:
When the royal family start to behave like ordinary
people, they will cease to represent us
Fr Alexander Lucie-Smith
Alexander Lucie-Smith is a Catholic priest and a doctor of moral theology.
Apparently there is huge public interest in the Prince
Harry story, or so I read here. I am not quite sure what this means. Does
it mean that it is in the public interest that these pictures be published? Are
they pictures we have the right to see, and the right to know about? The whole
argument strikes me as bizarre.
What does interest me, though, is the historical perspective. Traditionally British monarchs have been very badly behaved people, whose eating, drinking and fornicating has tended to the excessive: think of Henry VIII, or of Charles II – both of whom are popular figures, though with slightly different constituencies of admirers. George IV is perhaps the paradigm of royal excess, and was never popular in his lifetime, though some modern aesthetes do admire him (and rightly so: he had great taste in both books and buildings.)
As for the well-behaved, well they are few and far between. James II and William IV had exemplary private lives during their reigns, but both had rather wild youths. George III was really the first ever to be a good family man; Queen Victoria, Georges V and VI, and of course our irreproachable present monarch, all get the thumbs up, but Edwards VII and VIII do not. Edward VII was a popular monarch, but his private life was not subject to much scrutiny, and most of his subjects must have had very little idea of his addiction to gambling and lady friends.
Edward VII was, as the phrase went, “fast”. He moved in fast circles. He was the first monarch to have Jewish friends and indeed Roman Catholic friends (which I find to his credit.) He was in many ways ahead of his time. He was a hugely successful monarch, a true focus of national unity: he was well known for his affability, and people loved him.
Prince Harry and his circle are what you would expect of a 27 year old unmarried Guards officer who had been to Eton. So is his behaviour in Las Vegas. If his behaviour is disappointing, it is because it is so ordinary. There are pictures of similar riotous behaviour all over Facebook. This is the sort of thing that people of his age and background do. And here is the problem: the Royal family are meant to be rather different, aren’t they? They are meant to set an example, though an example of what, I am not quite sure.
On the day of the Duke and Duchess of Cambridge’s wedding, the assembled friends of the couple waiting in the Abbey before the service sounded exactly as you would have expected them to sound at any wedding where an Etonian married a Marlborough girl – that particular brand of upper class was much in evidence in the loud chatter’s vowels. (I seem to remember that Dr David Starkey pointed this out at the time.)
Does this matter? Oh yes it does. The monarch and her family are supposed to be a focus of national unity. If the day comes when the monarch and her family look like and sound like a very narrow section of British society, then on that day they cease to represent the nation, or rather the illusion that they represent the nation disappears.
Prince Harry, by his behaviour, has brought that day closer. Drunken and undignified horseplay in Vegas does not shock me one bit, it merely confirms that the things I would hope to see in any Royal family – seriousness, piety, a concern for the poor, affability, an ability to put people at their ease, along with a sense of fun and an ability to enjoy oneself in a good way – the sort of qualities that are seen in some other monarchies – are qualities not apparent in Prince Harry.
What does interest me, though, is the historical perspective. Traditionally British monarchs have been very badly behaved people, whose eating, drinking and fornicating has tended to the excessive: think of Henry VIII, or of Charles II – both of whom are popular figures, though with slightly different constituencies of admirers. George IV is perhaps the paradigm of royal excess, and was never popular in his lifetime, though some modern aesthetes do admire him (and rightly so: he had great taste in both books and buildings.)
As for the well-behaved, well they are few and far between. James II and William IV had exemplary private lives during their reigns, but both had rather wild youths. George III was really the first ever to be a good family man; Queen Victoria, Georges V and VI, and of course our irreproachable present monarch, all get the thumbs up, but Edwards VII and VIII do not. Edward VII was a popular monarch, but his private life was not subject to much scrutiny, and most of his subjects must have had very little idea of his addiction to gambling and lady friends.
Edward VII was, as the phrase went, “fast”. He moved in fast circles. He was the first monarch to have Jewish friends and indeed Roman Catholic friends (which I find to his credit.) He was in many ways ahead of his time. He was a hugely successful monarch, a true focus of national unity: he was well known for his affability, and people loved him.
Prince Harry and his circle are what you would expect of a 27 year old unmarried Guards officer who had been to Eton. So is his behaviour in Las Vegas. If his behaviour is disappointing, it is because it is so ordinary. There are pictures of similar riotous behaviour all over Facebook. This is the sort of thing that people of his age and background do. And here is the problem: the Royal family are meant to be rather different, aren’t they? They are meant to set an example, though an example of what, I am not quite sure.
On the day of the Duke and Duchess of Cambridge’s wedding, the assembled friends of the couple waiting in the Abbey before the service sounded exactly as you would have expected them to sound at any wedding where an Etonian married a Marlborough girl – that particular brand of upper class was much in evidence in the loud chatter’s vowels. (I seem to remember that Dr David Starkey pointed this out at the time.)
Does this matter? Oh yes it does. The monarch and her family are supposed to be a focus of national unity. If the day comes when the monarch and her family look like and sound like a very narrow section of British society, then on that day they cease to represent the nation, or rather the illusion that they represent the nation disappears.
Prince Harry, by his behaviour, has brought that day closer. Drunken and undignified horseplay in Vegas does not shock me one bit, it merely confirms that the things I would hope to see in any Royal family – seriousness, piety, a concern for the poor, affability, an ability to put people at their ease, along with a sense of fun and an ability to enjoy oneself in a good way – the sort of qualities that are seen in some other monarchies – are qualities not apparent in Prince Harry.
TODAY'S SAINT: AUG. 25: ST. LOUIS IX, KING OF FRANCE
 Information:
|
King
of France, son of Louis VIII and Blanche of Castile, born at Poissy, 25 April,
1215; died near Tunis, 25 August, 1270.
He
was eleven years of age when the death of Louis VIII made him king, and nineteen
when he married Marguerite of Provence by whom he had eleven children. The
regency of Blanche of Castile (1226-1234) was marked by the victorious struggle
of the Crown against Raymond VII in Languedoc, against Pierre Mauclerc in
Brittany, against Philip Hurepel in the Ile de France, and by indecisive combats
against Henry III of England. In this period of disturbances the queen was
powerfully supported by the legate Frangipani. Accredited to Louis VIII by
Honorius III as early as 1225, Frangipani won over to the French cause the
sympathies of Gregory IX, who was inclined to listen to Henry III, and through
his intervention it was decreed that all the chapters of the dioceses should pay
to Blanche of Castile tithes for the southern crusade. It was the legate who
received the submission of Raymond VII, Count of Languedoc, at Paris, in front
of Notre-Dame, and this submission put an end to the Albigensian war and
prepared the union of the southern provinces to France by the Treaty of Paris
(April 1229). The influence of Blanche de Castile over the government extended
far beyond St. Louis's minority. Even later, in public business and when
ambassadors were officially received, she appeared at his side. She died in
1253. In the first years of the king's personal government, the Crown had to
combat a fresh rebellion against feudalism, led by the Count de la Marche, in
league with Henry III. St. Louis's victory over this coalition at Taillebourg,
1242, was followed by the Peace of Bordeaux which annexed to the French realm a
part of Saintonge.
It
was one of St. Louis's chief characteristics to carry on abreast his
administration as national sovereign and the performance of his duties towards
Christendom; and taking advantage of the respite which the Peace of Bordeaux
afforded, he turned his thoughts towards a crusade. Stricken down with a fierce
malady in 1244, he resolved to take the cross when news came that Turcomans had
defeated the Christians and the Moslems and invaded Jerusalem. (On the two
crusades of St. Louis [1248-1249 and 1270] see CRUSADES.) Between the two
crusades he opened negotiations with Henry III, which he thought would prevent
new conflicts between France and England. The Treaty of Paris (28 May, 1258)
which St. Louis concluded with the King of England after five years' parley, has
been very much discussed. By this treaty St. Louis gave Henry III all the fiefs
and domains belonging to the King of France in the Dioceses of Limoges, Cahors,
and Perigueux; and in the event of Alphonsus of Poitiers dying without issue,
Saintonge and Agenais would escheat to Henry III. On the other hand Henry III
renounced his claims to Normandy, Anjou, Touraine, Maine, Poitou, and promised
to do homage for the Duchy of Guyenne. It was generally considered and Joinville
voiced the opinion of the people, that St. Louis made too many territorial
concessions to Henry III; and many historians held that if, on the contrary, St.
Louis had carried the war against Henry III further, the Hundred Years War would
have been averted. But St. Louis considered that by making the Duchy of Guyenne
a fief of the Crown of France he was gaining a moral advantage; and it is an
undoubted fact that the Treaty of Paris, was as displeasing to the English as it
was to the French. In 1263, St. Louis was chosen as arbitrator in a difference
which separated Henry III and the English barons: by the Dit d'Amiens (24
January, 1264) he declared himself for Henry III against the barons, and
annulled the Provisions of Oxford, by which the barons had attempted to restrict
the authority of the king. It was also in the period between the two crusades
that St. Louis, by the Treaty of Corbeil, imposed upon the King of Aragon the
abandonment of his claims to all the fiefs in Languedoc excepting Montpellier,
and the surrender of his rights to Provence (11 May, 1258). Treaties and
arbitrations prove St. Louis to have been above all a lover of peace, a king who
desired not only to put an end to conflicts, but also to remove the causes for
fresh wars, and this spirit of peace rested upon the Christian
conception.
St.
Louis's relations with the Church of France and the papal Court have excited
widely divergent interpretations and opinions. However, all historians agree
that St. Louis and the successive popes united to protect the clergy of France
from the encroachments or molestations of the barons and royal officers. It is
equally recognized that during the absence of St. Louis at the crusade, Blanche
of Castile protected the clergy in 1251 from the plunder and ill-treatment of a
mysterious old maurauder called the "Hungarian Master" who was followed by a mob
of armed men—called the "Pastoureaux." The "Hungarian Master" who was said to be
in league with the Moslems died in an engagement near Villaneuve and the entire
band pursued in every direction was dispersed and annihilated. But did St. Louis
take measures also to defend the independence of the clergy against the papacy?
A number of historians once claimed he did. They attributed to St. Louis a
certain "pragmatic sanction" of March 1269, prohibiting irregular collations of
ecclesiastical benefices, prohibiting simony, and interdicting the tributes
which the papal Court received from the French clergy. The Gallicans of the
seventeenth and eighteenth centuries often made use of this measure against the
Holy See; the truth is that it was a forgery fabricated in the fourteenth
century by juris-consults desirous of giving to the Pragmatic Sanction of
Charles VII a precedent worthy of respect. This so-called pragmatic of Louis IX
is presented as a royal decree for the reformation of the Church; never would
St. Louis thus have taken upon himself the right to proceed authoritatively with
this reformation. When in 1246, a great number of barons from the north and the
west leagued against the clergy whom they accused of amassing too great wealth
and of encroaching upon their rights, Innocent IV called upon Louis to dissolve
this league; how the king acted in the matter is not definitely known. On 2 May,
1247, when the Bishops of Soissons and of Troyes, the archdeacon of Tours, and
the provost of the cathedral of Rouen, despatched to the pope a remonstrance
against his taxations, his preferment of Italians in the distribution of
benefices, against the conflicts between papal jurisdiction and the jurisdiction
of the ordinaries, Marshal Ferri Paste seconded their complaints in the name of
St. Louis. Shortly after, these complaints were reiterated and detailed in a
lengthy memorandum, the text of which has been preserved by Mathieu Paris, the
historian. It is not known whether St. Louis affixed his signature to it, but in
any case, this document was simply a request asking for the suppression of the
abuses, with no pretensions to laying down principles of public right, as was
claimed by the Pragmatic Sanction.
Documents
prove that St. Louis did not lend an ear to the grievances of his clergy against
the emissaries of Urban IV and Clement IV; he even allowed Clement IV to
generalize a custom in 1265 according to which the benefices the titularies of
which died while sojourning in Rome, should be disposed of by the pope. Docile
to the decrees of the Lateran Council (1215), according to which kings were not
to tax the churches of their realm without authority from the pope, St. Louis
claimed and obtained from successive popes, in view of the crusade, the right to
levy quite heavy taxes from the clergy. It is again this fundamental idea of the
crusade, ever present in St. Louis's thoughts that prompted his attitude
generally in the struggle between the empire and the pope. While the Emperor
Frederick II and the successive popes sought and contended for France's support,
St. Louis's attitude was at once decided and reserved. On the one hand he did
not accept for his brother Robert of Artois, the imperial crown offered him by
Gregory IX in 1240. In his correspondence with Frederick he continued to treat
him as a sovereign, even after Frederick had been excommunicated and declared
dispossessed of his realms by Innocent IV at the Council of Lyons, 17 July,
1245. But on the other hand, in 1251, the king compelled Frederick to release
the French archbishops taken prisoners by the Pisans, the emperor's auxiliaries,
when on their way in a Genoese fleet to attend a general council at Rome. In
1245, he conferred at length, at Cluny, with Innocent IV who had taken refuge in
Lyons in December, 1244, to escape the threats of the emperor, and it was at
this meeting that the papal dispensation for the marriage of Charles Anuou,
brother of Louis IX, to Beatrix, heiress of Provençe was granted and it was then
that Louis IX and Blanche of Castile promised Innocent IV their support.
Finally, when in 1247 Frederick II took steps to capture Innocent IV at Lyons,
the measures Louis took to defend the pope were one of the reasons which caused
the emperor to withdraw. St. Louis looked upon every act of hostility from
either power as an obstacle to accomplishing the crusade. In the quarrel over
investitures, the king kept on friendly terms with both, not allowing the
emperor to harass the pope and never exciting the pope against the emperor. In
1262 when Urban offered St. Louis, the Kingdom of Sicily, a fief of the
Apostolic See, for one of his sons, St. Louis refused it, through consideration
for the Swabian dynasty then reigning; but when Charles of Anjou accepted Urban
IV's offer and went to conquer the Kingdom of Sicily, St. Louis allowed the
bravest knights of France to join the expedition which destroyed the power of
the Hohenstaufens in Sicily. The king hoped, doubtless, that the possession of
Sicily by Charles of Anjou would be advantageous to the
crusade.
St.
Louis led an exemplary life, bearing constantly in mind his mother's words: "I
would rather see you dead at my feet than guilty of a mortal sin." His
biographers have told us of the long hours he spent in prayer, fasting, and
penance, without the knowlege of his subjects. The French king was a great lover
of justice. French fancy still pictures him delivering judgements under the oak
of Vincennes. It was during his reign that the "court of the king" (curia regis)
was organized into a regular court of justice, having competent experts, and
judicial commissions acting at regular periods. These commissions were called
parlements and the history of the "Dit d'Amiens" proves that entire Christendom
willingly looked upon him as an international judiciary. It is an error,
however, to represent him as a great legislator; the document known as
"Etablissements de St. Louis" was not a code drawn up by order of the king, but
merely a collection of customs, written out before 1273 by a jurist who set
forth in this book the customs of Orlians, Anjou, and Maine, to which he added a
few ordinances of St. Louis. St. Louis was a patron of architecture. The Sainte
Chappelle, an architectural gem, was constructed in his reign, and it was under
his patronage that Robert of Sorbonne founded the "Collège de la Sorbonne,"
which became the seat of the theological faculty of Paris. He was renowned for
his charity. The peace and blessings of the realm come to us through the poor he
would say. Beggars were fed from his table, he ate their leavings, washed their
feet, ministered to the wants of the lepers, and daily fed over one hundred
poor. He founded many hospitals and houses: the House of the Felles-Dieu for
reformed prostitutes; the Quinze-Vingt for 300 blind men (1254), hospitals at
Pontoise, Vernon, Compihgne.
The
Enseignements (written instructions) which he left to his son Philip and to his
daughter Isabel, the discourses preserved by the witnesses at judicial
investigations preparatory to his canonization and Joinville's anecdotes show
St. Louis to have been a man of sound common sense, posssessing indefatigable
energy, graciously kind and of playful humour, and constantly guarding against
the temptation to be imperious. The caricature made of him by the envoy of the
Count of Gueldre: "worthless devotee, hypocritical king" was very far from the
truth. On the contrary, St. Louis, through his personal qualities as well as his
saintliness, increased for many centuries the prestige of the French monarchy
(see FRANCE). St. Louis's canonization was proclaimed at Orvieto in 1297, by
Boniface VIII. Of the inquiries in view of canonization, carried on from 1273
till 1297, we have only fragmentary reports published by Delaborde ("Memoires de
la societe de l'histoire de Paris et de l'Ilea de France," XXIII, 1896) and a
series of extracts compiled by Guillaume de St. Pathus, Queen Marguerite's
confessor, under the title of "Vie Monseigneur Saint Loys" (Paris,1899). source:
EWTN
|
TODAY'S MASS ONLINE FRIDAY AUGUST 24, 2012
| John
1: 45 - 51
| |
| 45 | Philip found Nathan'a-el, and said to him, "We have found him of whom Moses in the law and also the prophets wrote, Jesus of Nazareth, the son of Joseph." |
| 46 | Nathan'a-el said to him, "Can anything good come out of Nazareth?" Philip said to him, "Come and see." |
| 47 | Jesus saw Nathan'a-el coming to him, and said of him, "Behold, an Israelite indeed, in whom is no guile!" |
| 48 | Nathan'a-el said to him, "How do you know me?" Jesus answered him, "Before Philip called you, when you were under the fig tree, I saw you." |
| 49 | Nathan'a-el answered him, "Rabbi, you are the Son of God! You are the King of Israel!" |
| 50 | Jesus answered him, "Because I said to you, I saw you under the fig tree, do you believe? You shall see greater things than these." |
| 51 | And he said to him, "Truly, truly, I say to you, you will see heaven opened, and the angels of God ascending and descending upon the Son of man." |
Subscribe to: Posts (Atom)
