From: richarra@gmail.com   
      
    -- Isaiah 48:17-18 --   
      
   Thus says the Lord,   
       your Redeemer, the Holy One of Israel:   
   “I am the Lord your God,   
       who teaches you to profit,   
       who leads you in the way you should go.   
   18 O that you had hearkened to my commandments!   
       Then your peace would have been like a river,   
       and your righteousness like the waves of the sea;  RSVCE   
   ===================   
   Like a loving parent, God teaches us and directs us. We should listen   
   to him because peace and righteousness come to us as we obey his Word.   
   Refusing to pay attention to God's commands invites punishment and   
   threatens that peace and righteousness.   
      
   <<>><<>><<>>   
   September 9th – Saint Bettelin of Croyland   
   (also known as Beccelin, Bertelin, Berthelm, Bertram, Bethlin, Bethelm)   
      
   8th century. Saint Bettelin, a disciple of Saint Guthlac, was a hermit   
   who practiced the most austere penances and lived a life of continual   
   prayer in the forest near Stafford, England. He received counsel from   
   his master on his deathbed and was present at his burial. After the   
   death of Guthlac, Bettelin and his companions continued to live at   
   Croyland under Kenulphus, its first abbot.   
      
   There are unreliable legends about Bettelin, including a later one   
   that he had to overcome temptation to cut Guthlac's throat while   
   shaving him. They also say that Bettelin was the son of a local ruler   
   who fell in love with a princess during a visit to Ireland. On their   
   return to England, she died a terrible death. He left her in the   
   forest when she was overcome by labor pains, while he had gone in   
   search of a midwife. During his absence she was torn to pieces by   
   ravenous wolves. Thereafter, Bettelin became a hermit. Another legends   
   relates that Saint Bettelin left his hermitage to drive off invaders   
   with the help of an angel, before returning to his cell to die.   
      
   Some of his relics may have been translated to Stafford before the   
   plunder and burning of Croyland by the Danes. He is the patron of   
   Stafford, in which his relics were kept with great veneration   
   (Benedictines, Delaney, Farmer, Husenbeth).   
      
   Also see longer version found at:   
   http://www.newmanreader.org/works/saints/bettelin.html   
      
      
   Saint Quote:   
   If you have men who will exclude any of God's creatures from the   
   shelter of compassion and pity, you will have men who will deal   
   likewise with their fellow men.   
   -- Saint Francis of Assisi   
      
   Bible Quote:   
   "One body and one Spirit: as you are called in one hope of your   
   calling. One Lord, one faith, one Baptism"  (Eph 4:5)   
      
      
   <><><><>   
   THIRTY-ONE DAYS OF PRAYER FOR THE HOLY SOULS   
   FROM THE PURGATORIAN MANUAL  (Imprimatur 1946)   
      
   16th Day   
      
   THE EFFICACY OF PRAYER FOR THE SUFFERING SOULS   
      
       "It is a holy and wholesome thought to pray for the dead that they   
   may be loosed from their sins." (2 Mach. xii. 46)   
      
   Prayer for the dead is holy, because pleasing to God; wholesome,   
   because, through the merciful goodness of God it accomplishes its   
   sublime and charitable object. Nothing is so pleasing to God as the   
   sacrifice of love and mercy, especially when offered for the suffering   
   souls, whom He loves most tenderly, because they are holy and sure of   
   Heaven.   
      
     To relieve the suffering souls we can do scarcely anything more   
   salutary than to gain indulgences applicable to them, offering to God   
   the perfect satisfaction of Christ and the saints, and performing good   
   works in their behalf, that they may be comforted or entirely   
   delivered from the pains of Purgatory.   
      
     A suffering soul may receive an entire or a temporary remission of   
   her penalty, in accordance with the indulgence applied, being either   
   plenary or partial.   
      
   Prayer: Open, O Lord! the rich treasures of Thy holy Church, in favor   
   of the souls in Purgatory that they may receive full pardon, or, at   
   least some relief in their pains; and grant us grace to deliver and to   
   comfort a great number of suffering souls by prayer and good works.   
   Through Christ, our Lord. Amen.   
      
   Special Intercession: Pray for the souls, who, during their earthly   
   career, endeavored to gain many indulgences for the faithful departed.   
      
   Eternal rest grant unto them, O Lord, and let perpetual light shine   
   upon them; may they rest in peace. Amen.  (3 times)   
      
   Practice: Apply all the indulgences you can gain to the souls in Purgatory.   
      
   Invocation: My Jesus, mercy!   
      
   --- SoupGate-Win32 v1.05   
    * Origin: you cannot sedate... all the things you hate (1:229/2)