From: richarra@gmail.com   
      
   - 1 Peter 4:7-9 -   
      
       The end of all things is near. Therefore be clear minded and   
   self-controlled   
   so that you can pray. Above all, love each other deeply, because love covers   
   over a multitude of sins. Offer hospitality to one another without   
   grumbling.   
   ______________________________________________________________________   
      
    We should live expectantly, because Christ is coming. Getting ready to meet   
   Christ involves continually growing in love for God and for others. It is   
   important to pray regularly, and it is also important to reach out to needy   
   people. Your possessions, status and power will mean nothing in God's   
   Kingdom,   
   but you will spend eternity with other people. Invest your time and talents   
   where they will make an eternal difference.   
      
      
   <><><><><>   
   July 28th - Sts. Nazarius and Celsus, Martyrs   
    (First century)   
      
   Saint Nazarius, born in Rome, was the son of a pagan military man who held   
   an   
   important post in the Roman army. His mother, honored by the Church as Saint   
   Perpetua, was a zealous Christian, instructed by Saint Peter or his   
   disciples in   
   the most perfect maxims of Christianity. Nazarius at the age of nine   
   embraced   
   the Faith with so much ardor that he copied in his own young life all the   
   great   
   virtues he saw in his teachers. He was baptized by Saint Linus, who would   
   later   
   become Pope. His pagan father was touched by his son's virtue and seconded   
   his   
   project to go elsewhere to preach the Gospel. Out of zeal for the salvation   
   of   
   others, Nazarius therefore left Rome, his native city, and preached the   
   Faith in   
   many places with a fervor and disinterestedness fitting for a disciple of   
   the   
   Apostles.   
      
   Ten years later he is known to have been in Milan. He was driven from the   
   city   
   by the prefect after being whipped, and he left Italy to go to eastern Gaul   
   or   
   France. There a young boy by the name of Celsus was brought to him; his   
   mother   
   asked him to teach and baptize her son, and to take him for his disciple.   
   The   
   child was docile, and Nazarius did so; and they were never separated. When   
   conversions multiplied, the local governor was alarmed and the apostle was   
   again   
   arrested, beaten and tortured. The wife of this governor was a Christian,   
   however, and succeeded in obtaining liberty for the two young innocents.   
   They   
   were freed on condition they would not preach at this place any longer.   
      
   The two fervent Christians went to the Alpine villages where only a few   
   solitary   
   settlers braved the rigors of the climate and the altitude. They were not   
   rebuffed and went as far as Embrun. There they built a chapel to the true   
   God,   
   and then continued on to Geneva, and to Treves where Saint Nazarius was   
   arrested   
   and imprisoned. Celsus followed him in tears, longing to share his   
   captivity.   
   When after a few days the prefect ordered them brought before him, they were   
   treated cruelly but appeared before the magistrate, their faces shining with   
   glory. The prodigies which followed caused fear in the pagans, and they were   
   released and told to leave the region.   
      
   They returned to Milan, but were soon arrested there also. When they would   
   not   
   sacrifice to the gods of the empire, after several tortures in which God   
   again   
   preserved them, they were sentenced to be beheaded. They embraced one   
   another in   
   transports of joy and praise to God for this grace. It was during the reign   
   of   
   Nero, in about the year 56, that these generous Martyrs added their blood to   
   the   
   treasure of the Christians.   
      
   Their bodies were buried separately in a garden outside the city, where they   
   were discovered and taken up by Saint Ambrose in 395. In the tomb of Saint   
   Nazarius, whose decapitated body and head were perfectly conserved, a vial   
   of   
   the Saint's blood was found as fresh and red as if it had been spilt that   
   same   
   day. Saint Ambrose conveyed the bodies of the two martyrs into the new   
   church of   
   the Apostles which he had just built. A woman was delivered of an evil   
   spirit in   
   their presence. Saint Ambrose sent some of these relics to Saint Paulinus of   
   Nola, who received them with great respect as a most valuable gift, as he   
   himself testifies, and placed them in honor at Nola.   
      
   Reflection: The martyrs died as the outcasts of the world, but are crowned   
   by   
   God with immortal honor. The glory of the world is false and transitory, an   
   empty bubble or shadow, but that of virtue is true, solid, and permanent,   
   even   
   in the eyes of men.   
      
   Sources: Little Pictorial Lives of the Saints, a compilation based on   
   Butler's   
   Lives of the Saints, and other sources by John Gilmary Shea (Benziger   
   Brothers:   
   New York, 1894); Les Petits Bollandistes: Vies des Saints, by Msgr. Paul   
   Guérin   
   (Bloud et Barral: Paris, 1882), Vol. 9.   
      
      
   Saint Quote:   
   It is here, my daughters, that love is to be found-not hidden away in   
   corners   
   but in the midst of occasions of sin. And believe me, although we may more   
   often   
   fail and commit small lapses, our gain will be incomparably the greater.   
   --St. Teresa of Avila   
      
   Bible Quote   
   1. If there be therefore any consolation in Christ, if any comfort of   
   charity,   
   if any society of the spirit, if any bowels of commiseration: 2. Fulfill ye   
   my   
   joy, that you may be of one mind, having the same charity, being of one   
   accord,   
   agreeing in sentiment. 3. Let nothing be done through contention, neither by   
   vain glory: but in humility, let each esteem others better than themselves:   
   4.   
   Each one not considering the things that are his own, but those that are   
   other   
   men's. 5. For let this mind be in you, which was also in Christ Jesus:   
   (Philippians 2:1-5)   
      
      
   <><><><>   
   Take, O Lord, and receive all my liberty, my memory, my   
   understanding, and all my will, whatsoever I have and   
   possess. Thou hast given all these things to me; to Thee, O   
   Lord, I restore them; all are Thine, dispose of them all ac-   
   cording to Thy Will. Give me Thy love and Thy grace, for   
   this is enough for me.   
      
      
   <><><><>   
   A prayer to Christ to overcoming a sin of passion:   
      
   Beloved Jesus, in the Sacrament of the Altar, be forever thanked and   
   praised.  Love, worthy of all celestial and terrestrial!  Who, out of   
   infinite love for me, an ungrateful sinner, didst assume my nature, didst   
   shed Thy most Precious Blood in the cruel scourging, and didst expire on a   
   shameful cross for my eternal welfare.   
      
   Now, illumined with lively faith, with the outpouring of my whole soul and   
   the fervor of my heart, I humbly beseech Thee, through the infinite merits   
   of Thy painful sufferings, give me strength and courage to destroy and every   
    evil passion which sways my heart, to bless Thee in my greatest   
   afflictions, to glorify Thee by the exact fulfillment of my duties,   
   supremely hate all sin, and thus to become a Saint.  Amen.   
      
   --- SoupGate-Win32 v1.05   
    * Origin: you cannot sedate... all the things you hate (1:229/2)