From: richarra@gmail.com   
      
   Appreciating God’s Grace (3)   
      
     I do not desire consolation that robs me of contrition, nor do I   
   care for contemplation that leads to pride, for not all that is high   
   is holy, nor is all that is sweet good, nor every desire pure, nor all   
   that is dear to us pleasing to God. I accept willingly the grace   
   whereby I become more humble and contrite, more willing to renounce   
   self.   
     The man who has been taught by the gift of grace, and who learns by   
   the lash of its withdrawal, will never dare to attribute any good to   
   himself, but will rather admit his poverty and emptiness. Give to God   
   what is God’s and ascribe to yourself what is yours. Give Him thanks,   
   then, for His grace, but place upon yourself alone the blame and the   
   punishment your fault deserves.   
   --Thomas à Kempis --Imitation of Christ Book 2, Chapter 10   
      
      
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   September 2nd - St. Justus of Lyons, Bishop and Recluse   
      
   Memorial   
   2 September   
   14 October   
      
   At Lyons in France, the translation of St. Justus, bishop and   
   confessor, and Viator, his servant,   
      
   Justus was born in the Vivarais, and whilst he served the church of   
   Vienne as deacon he was advanced to the see of Lyons. His zeal made   
   him severe in reproving everything that deserved reproof, and his   
   attachment to discipline and good order was displayed at the Synod of   
   Valence in the year 374. A council being assembled at Aquileia in 381,   
   St. Justus with two other bishops from Gaul assisted at it. The chief   
   affairs there debated regarded the Arians, and St. Ambrose, who was   
   present, procured the deposition of two Arian bishops. He had a   
   particular respect for St. Justus, as appears from two letters which   
   he addressed to him concerning certain biblical questions.   
      
   It happened that at Lyons a man, who had stabbed some persons in the   
   street, took sanctuary in the church; and St Justus delivered him into   
   the hands of the magistrate’s officer upon a promise that the   
   prisoner’s life should be spared. Notwithstanding this he was   
   dispatched by the populace. The good bishop was apprehensive that he   
   had been accessory to his death and was by that disqualified for the   
   ministry of the altar. Having long desired to serve God in retirement,   
   it is said that he made use of this as a pretext to resign the   
   pastoral charge. The opposition of his flock seemed an obstacle, but   
   his journey to Aquileia afforded him an opportunity. On his return he   
   stole from his friends in the night, and at Marseilles took ship with   
   a lector of his church, named Viator, and sailed to Alexandria. He   
   lived unknown in a monastery in Egypt, until he was discovered by one   
   who came from Gaul to visit the monasteries in the Thebaid, and the   
   church of Lyons sent a priest called Antiochus to urge him to return   
   but he was not to be prevailed upon. Antiochus (who succeeded Justus   
   in his see and is himself venerated as a saint, on October 15)   
   determined to bear him company in his solitude, and the saint shortly   
   after died in his arms about the year 390. His body was soon after   
   translated to Lyons and buried in the church of the Macchabees which   
   afterwards bore his name. His minister St. Viator survived him only a   
   few weeks, and is named in the Roman Martyrology on October 21, and   
   the translation of their bodies together on September 2.   
      
   Alban Butler states that the village of Saint Just in Cornwall takes   
   its name from Justus of Lyons. This seems to be a guess, and a poor   
   one--there are two Cornish Saint Justus one in Roseland and another in   
   Penwith, but their eponyms have not been identified.   
      
   An early Latin life of St. Justus is printed in the Acts Sanctorum,   
   September, vol. i (under September 2), and there seems no reason to   
   doubt that it is in the main reliable. The fact that Justus is   
   mentioned on five different days in the Hieronymianum (see CMH., pp.   
   566-567) may be taken as satisfactory proof of the interest which his   
   cultus inspired. Sidonius Apollinaris in a letter gives a description   
   of the enthusiasm with which crowds flocked to the shrine on his   
   feast-day. Consult also Duchesne, Pastes Episcopaux, vol. ii, p. i6z   
   Coville, Recherches sur l’histoire d Lyon (1928), pp. 441-445 and   
   Leclercq, DAC., vol. X, Cc. 191-193.   
      
      
   Saint Quote:   
   No greater pride is there than judging others, nor is there anything   
   for which God abandons man, more than for judging others. Everywhere   
   in the Scriptures God tells us clearly not to judge others, but rather   
   ourselves. Likewise spiritual writers condemn this fault of judging   
   others with so many examples that the day would sooner be over than we   
   could relate just a few of them. Take this thought for a conclusion:   
   the beginning of the ruin of the spiritual life is judging others.   
   --Saint Anthony Mary Zaccaria from a sermon   
      
   Bible Quote:   
   Blessed is the man that endureth temptation: for, when he hath been   
   proved, he shall receive the crown of life which God hath promised to   
   them that love him.  [James 1:12] DRB   
      
      
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   --We must always pray, and not faint.--Luke 18:1   
      
   [3] Souls that have no habit of prayer are like a lame and paralytic   
   body, which, though it has hands and feet, cannot use them. Therefore,   
   to abandon prayer seems to me the same thing as to lose the straight   
   road; for as prayer is the gate through which all the graces of God   
   come to us, when this is closed, I do not know how we can have any.   
   --St. Teresa   
      
   St. Teresa proved this by her own experience; for having abandoned   
   prayer for some time, she began to fall into certain faults and   
   defects from which, though they were slight, she could not free   
   herself; rather, she went daily from bad to worse. She was herself   
   obliged to say that she was on the road to perdition, to which the   
   Lord told her she would have come, if she had not resumed prayer.   
      
   ( "A Year with the Saints".   September: Prayer   
      
   --- SoupGate-Win32 v1.05   
    * Origin: you cannot sedate... all the things you hate (1:229/2)