From: richarra@gmail.com   
      
   Sorrow of Heart (1)   
      
      IF YOU wish to make progress in virtue, live in the fear of the   
   Lord, do not look for too much freedom, discipline your senses, and   
   shun inane silliness. Sorrow opens the door to many a blessing which   
   dissoluteness usually destroys.   
      It is a wonder that any man who considers and meditates on his   
   exiled state and the many dangers to his soul, can ever be perfectly   
   happy in this life. Lighthearted and heedless of our defects, we do   
   not feel the real sorrows of our souls, but often indulge in empty   
   laughter when we have good reason to weep. No liberty is true and no   
   joy is genuine unless it is founded in the fear of the Lord and a good   
   conscience.   
   --Thomas à Kempis --Imitation of Christ Chapter 21   
      
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   July 16th - St. Mary Magdalen Postel   
    (also known as Julia Frances Catherine Postel)   
      
    Born at Barfleur, Normandy, France, Nov. 28, 1756; died at   
   Saint-Sauveur-le-Vicomte, July 16, 1846; canonized 1925.   
      
   Whenever the Church is under persecution by despots, God provides   
   “underground” leaders to keep it functioning. One such lay leader   
   during the French Revolution was St. Mary Magdalen Postel, and after   
   the Revolution she founded a community of nuns to strengthen the Faith   
   in France.   
      
   Julia Postel, a native of Barfleur in Normandy, received a   
   convent-school education in the pre-revolutionary days. While in   
   school she decided to devote her life to God’s service. She took a   
   private vow of perpetual virginity and on graduation opened a small   
   school for girls. Obviously, she had talents as an educator, for she   
   soon won praise for the well-rounded training that she gave to her   
   pupils.   
      
   This school was to last only five years, however. The French   
   Revolution broke the dam in 1789. In 1790 the French National Assembly   
   enacted a law that was to affect French Catholicism very   
   destructively. Called the “civil Constitution of the Clergy,” it   
   required that all priests take an oath denying papal authority in   
   France. Some bishops and priests and laity buckled under and took this   
   oath. Thus they became adherents of the schismatic French   
   “constitutional Church.” Others of the clergy and laity refused to   
   turn away from the pope — heroically, too, for the government imposed   
   execution or exile on those clergy caught ministering secretly to the   
   faithful. The beleaguered Catholic clergy could not have carried on   
   were it not for the assistance of the loyal Catholic layfolk.   
      
   Julia Postel was one of these courageous aides. When the Abbe Lamache,   
   the legitimate Catholic pastor of Barfleur whom the government had   
   deposed, needed a site for his secret Masses, Julia outfitted a small   
   chapel beneath the stairs in her home. The Abbe even reserved the   
   Blessed Sacrament there. When that became too risky, he allowed Julia   
   to carry a few consecrated hosts on her own person and commissioned   
   her to take communion to the sick. All this no doubt placed a strain   
   upon the young woman, but she discharged her role so discreetly that   
   even the police, when on one occasion they inspected her home in vain   
   for signs of “subversion,” agreed to molest her no further: “She does   
   nobody any harm,” they said, “and is very kind to the children.”   
      
   Once Napoleon became head of the government in 1809, matters religious   
   began to change for the better, and Mlle. Postel busied herself anew   
   with the public religious instruction of both children and adults, and   
   with organizing charities. Her prayer-life continued to become even   
   more intense.   
      
   Only at age 51, however, was Julia able to undertake her long-maturing   
   plans. She went to Cherbourg, and with the assistance of the local   
   chaplain, Abbe Cabart, she opened a school. She was assisted by three   
   young women who had agreed to work towards the establishment of a new   
   religious teaching community. They took their vows in 1807. Julia   
   adopted the religious name of Mary Magdalen, and was the first   
   superior. Soon this small religious order was busy instructing 200   
   girls in academics, training others in handicrafts, rescuing abandoned   
   children and ministering to the needs of the poor.   
      
   All did not run smoothly, however. In 1811 the exiled Sisters of   
   Providence returned to Cherbourg. Mother Postel did not want to engage   
   in rivalry with them, so she moved to another town. Everything went   
   wrong at that place and at three other locales where they tried to   
   make a new start. Even Abbe Cabart advised them to dissolve. Mother   
   Margaret Mary refused. They would rely on God’s providence, she said.   
      
   Her hope was not deferred. When the sisters began anew at Tamerville,   
   they quickly won favor because of the assistance they gave to the   
   people during a famine. Now the order began to grow. There were still   
   difficulties. State law demanded that she take a government   
   examination to prove that she was “qualified” as a teacher. A church   
   decree imposed a new rule and a new name, “The sisters of the   
   Christian Schools of Mercy.” But she accepted these minor problems   
   with good grace.   
      
   When she died in her 90th year, Mother Postel could look back on years   
   of patience providentially rewarded. Of all her memories, however, I   
   imagine that the greatest may have been the years when she was able to   
   be a living tabernacle of the Blessed Sacrament. It was a rare   
   privilege; yet do we not enjoy something of the sort every time we   
   receive Holy Communion into our hearts?   
      
   See the life by Mgr Grente (Eng. trans., 1928) and his Une sainte   
   normande (1946).  There are other lives in French, e.g. by Mgr Legoux   
   (1908, in two volumes) and by P. de Crisenoy (1938).   
   –Father Robert F. McNamara   
      
      
   Saint Quote:   
   For we have learnt not to "have thought for the flesh to fulfil its   
   desires." We are to "walk honourably as in the way", that is in Christ   
   and in the enlightened conduct of the Lord's way, "not in revelling   
   and drunkenness, not in debauchery and lasciviousness, not in strife   
   and envy."   
   --St. Clement of Alexandria   
      
   Bible Quote:   
     O the depth of the riches of the wisdom and of the knowledge of God!   
   How incomprehensible are his judgments, and how unsearchable his ways!   
     [Romans 11:33]   DRB   
      
      
   <><><><>   
    Simplicity is nothing but an act of charity pure and simple, which   
   has but one sole end-that of gaining the love of God.  Our soul is   
   then truly simple, when we have no aim at all but this, in all we do.   
   --St. Francis de Sales   
      
   11. Do not reason about afflictions and contradictions, but receive   
      
   [continued in next message]   
      
   --- SoupGate-Win32 v1.05   
    * Origin: you cannot sedate... all the things you hate (1:229/2)