From: richarra@gmail.com   
      
   O Beauty, So Ancient and So New   
      
      "Too late have I loved you, O Beauty so ancient and so new, too   
   late have I loved you. You have called to me, and have cried out, and   
   have shattered my deafness. You have blazed forth with light and have   
   put my blindness to flight!   
      You have sent forth fragrance, and I have drawn in my breath, and I   
   pant after you. I have tasted you, and I hunger and thrist after you.   
   You have touched me, and I have burned for your peace."   
   --St. Augustine--Confessions 10, 27   
      
   Prayer: My faith, O Lord, which you gave me through the humanity of   
   your Son, calls upon you.   
   --St. Augustine--Confessions 1, 1   
      
      
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   March 16th - Saint Heribert of Cologne   
   Also known as Eriberto, Herbert, Bert, Herko   
   d.1021   
      
   ST. HERIBERT, one of the most distinguished of the prelates who have   
   ruled over the diocese of Cologne, was born in the town of Worms in   
   the Palatinate of the Rhine, and as he showed himself eager to learn   
   he was sent to the celebrated abbey of Gorze in Lorraine. There he   
   would fain have entered the Benedictine Order, but his father had   
   other ambitions for him and recalled him peremptorily to Worms, where   
   the young man was given a canonry and was raised to the priesthood.   
   Heribert gained the confidence of the Emperor Otto III, whose   
   chancellor he became, and in 998 he was raised to the see of Cologne   
   amid general approval.   
      
   The one dissident was Heribert himself, who declared and honestly   
   believed that he was quite unfitted for the high dignity. From   
   Benevento, whither he was summoned by Otto, he passed on to Rome, and   
   there received the pallium from Pope Silvester II. He then returned to   
   Cologne, which he entered humbly with bare feet on a cold December   
   day, having sent the pallium on before him. It was on Christmas eve   
   that he was consecrated archbishop in the cathedral of St. Peter, and   
   from that moment he devoted himself indefatigably to the duties of his   
   high calling. State affairs were never allowed to hinder him from   
   preaching, from relieving the sick and needy, and from acting as   
   peacemaker throughout his diocese. He did not despise the outward   
   splendour which his position required, but under his gold-embroidered   
   vesture he always wore a hair-shirt. The more the business of the   
   world pressed upon him, the more strenuously did he strive to nourish   
   the spiritual life within.   
      
   Soon after taking possession of his see, Heribert accompanied the   
   emperor on another visit to Italy, which was to prove Otto’s last, for   
   he died there, probably of smallpox, not, as alleged, by poison. In   
   accordance with his master’s last wishes St. Heribert brought his body   
   back to Aachen, where it was buried. He also bore with him the   
   imperial insignia for he foresaw that there would be a contest for the   
   imperial crown, and he felt in duty bound to retain possession of the   
   insignia with which he had been entrusted until he could hand them   
   over to the properly constituted sovereign. Unfortunately the nearest   
   claimant, Duke Henry of Bavaria, misinterpreted his attitude and   
   concluded that the archbishop would have preferred to see some other   
   sovereign chosen. The consequence was that St. Heribert was in   
   disfavour with the duke, and continued to be so long after St. Henry   
   II had been duly elected king and emperor, and in spite of the fact   
   that the prelate had immediately yielded up the insignia, proving   
   himself on every occasion one of the emperor’s most loyal supporters.   
   Henry does not appear to have taken from him the chancellorship, for   
   his name appears appended to edicts of the years 1007 and 1008, but it   
   was only towards the close of Henry’s reign that the emperor learned   
   to appreciate the virtue and good faith of the great archbishop, and   
   there was a public and moving reconciliation between the two saintly   
   men who had been so long estranged.   
      
   St. Heribert would gladly have freed himself from secular business to   
   be at liberty to devote the rest of his life to the spiritual needs of   
   his diocese and people. On the opposite side of the Rhine, at Deutz,   
   he and Otto III had begun a monastery and church which he afterwards   
   completed with the help of money which that emperor had bequeathed to   
   him. His own income he habitually divided between the Church and the   
   poor, reserving for his personal use only what was absolutely   
   necessary. He would often steal away and seek out the sick and poor in   
   their homes and in hospitals; he relieved them, washed their feet, and   
   by his example inspired others to do likewise. Not did he confine his   
   charity to Cologne, hut sent money to priests he could trust in other   
   towns to be spent on assisting the destitute. At a time of great   
   drought the archbishop instituted a penitential procession from the   
   church of St. Severinus to that of St. Pantaleon, and exhorted the   
   multitude to do penance and to trust in God. Some of those present   
   declared that they saw a white dove flying close to the saint’s head   
   as he walked with the procession. Entering the church of St. Severinus   
   Heribert went up to the high altar and, bowing his head in his hands,   
   gave himself to earnest prayer for his people. Scarcely had he risen   
   from his knees when a torrential rain poured down upon the city and   
   the countryside, and the harvest was saved, Another procession which   
   he instituted to avert plague and famine took place round the walls of   
   the city in Easter week and was kept up each year until the end of the   
   18th century. He is still invoked for rain.   
      
   Zealous for the maintenance of discipline amongst the clergy, Heribert   
   was assiduous in his visitations, and it was when visiting Neuss for   
   one of these pastoral visits that he contracted a fever which he soon   
   recognized as destined to be fatal. With great fervour the saint   
   received viaticum and then suffered himself to be borne back to   
   Cologne. After being laid at the foot of the crucifix in the cathedral   
   of St. Peter and commending himself and his flock to the mercy of God,   
   he was carried to his own house, and shortly afterwards he breathed   
   his last. His body was laid at Deutz, where in after years many   
   miracles were attributed to his intercession.   
      
   The archbishop had been the founder of the abbey and minster of Deutz,   
   and the monks were naturally solicitous that his memory should be held   
   in veneration. A short biography of him was accordingly written by   
   Lantbert, one of the monks. There is a long account of St. Heribert in   
   Kleinermanns, Die Heiligen auf den erzb. Stuhl von Koln, vol. ii.   
      
      
      
   [continued in next message]   
      
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    * Origin: you cannot sedate... all the things you hate (1:229/2)