From: richarra@gmail.com   
      
   September 16th - St. Edith of Wilton   
      
    (AD 961-984)   
   St. Edith of Wilton was the illegitimate daughter of King Edgar the   
   Peaceable, born AD 961 at Kemsing in Kent. Her mother was St. Wulfthrith, a   
   nun of noble birth, whom Edgar forcibly carried off from her monastery at   
   Wilton. Under St. Dunstan's direction, he did penance for this crime by not   
   wearing his crown for seven years. As soon as Wulfthrith could escape from   
   him, she returned to her cell and, there, Edith was brought up. Educated   
   with great care, she became a wonder of beauty, learning and piety. After   
   his wife's death, Edgar would have married Wulfthrith, but she preferred to   
   remain a nun at Wilton. Edith took the veil very early, with her father's   
   consent. He made her abbess of three different communities, but she chose to   
   remain under her mother at Wilton, where she was a Martha with regard to her   
   sister nuns, and a Mary in her devotion to Christ.   
      
   In AD 979 Edith dreamt that she lost her right eye and knew the dream was   
   sent to warn her of the death of her brother, who, in fact, was murdered at   
   that very time, while visiting his step-mother, Queen Aelfthritha, at Corfe   
   Castle in Dorset. The nobles then offered the crown to Edith, but she   
   declined. Notwithstanding her refusal of all Royal honours and worldly   
   power, she always dressed magnificently and, as St. Aethelwold remonstrated,   
   she answered that purity and humility could exist as well under Royal robes   
   as under rags. She built a church at Wilton, and dedicated it in the name of   
   St. Denis. St. Dunstan was invited to the dedication and wept much during   
   mass. Being asked the reason, he said it was because Edith would die in   
   three weeks, which actually happened, on 15th September AD 984.   
      
   A month afterwards, she appeared in glory, to her mother, and told her the   
   devil had tried to accuse her, but she had broken his head. Many years   
   after, King Canute laughed at the idea that the daughter of the licentious   
   Edgar could be a saint. St. Dunstan took her out of her coffin and set her   
   upright in the church, whereupon Canute was terrified, and fell down in a   
   faint. He had a great veneration for St. Edith ever after.   
      
   Edited from Agnes Dunbar's "A Dictionary of Saintly Women" (1904).   
      
      
   Saint Quote:   
   God's invitation to become saints is for all, not just a few. Sanctity   
   therefore must be accessible to all. In what does it consist? In a lot of   
   activity? No. In doing extraordinary things? No, this could not be for   
   everybody and at all times. Therefore, sanctity consists in doing good, and   
   in doing this good in whatever condition and place God has placed us.   
   Nothing more, nothing outside of this.   
   --Blessed Louis Tezza   
      
   Bible Quote:   
   Neither he who plants is anything, nor he who waters, but God who gives the   
   growth.  (I Cor. 3:7)   
      
      
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   Act of Reparation to the Sacred Heart   
      
   O Sweet Jesus, whose overflowing charity for men is requited by so much   
   forgetfulness, negligence, and contempt, behold us prostrate before Thy   
   altar eager to repair by a special act of homage the cruel indifference and   
   injuries to which Thy loving Heart is everywhere subject.   
      
   Mindful alas! that we ourselves have had a share in such great   
   indignities, which we deplore from the depths of our hearts, we humbly ask   
   Thy pardon and declare our readiness to atone by voluntary expiation not   
   only for our own personal offenses, but also for the sins of those, who,   
   straying far from the path of salvation, refuse in their obstinate   
   infidelity to follow Thee, their Shepherd and leader, or, renouncing the   
   vows of their baptism, have cast off the sweet yoke of Thy law.  We are now   
   resolved to expiate each and every deplorable outrage committed against   
   Thee, we are determined to make amends for the manifold offenses against   
   Christian modesty in unbecoming dress and behavior, for all the foul   
   seductions laid to ensnare the feet of the innocent, for the frequent   
   violations of Sundays and holy days, and the shocking blasphemies uttered   
   against Thee and Thy saints.  We wish also to make amends for the insults to   
   which Thy Vicar on earth and Thy priests are subjected, for the profanation,   
   by conscious neglect or terrible acts of sacrilege, of the very Sacrament of   
   Thy Divine Love; and lastly for the public crimes of nations who resist the   
   rights and the teaching authority of the Church which Thou hast founded.   
      
   Would, O Divine Jesus, that we were able to wash away such abominations   
   with our blood.  We now offer, in reparation for these violations of Thy   
   Divine Honor, the satisfaction Thou didst once make to Thy Eternal Father on   
   the cross and which Thou dost continue to renew daily on our altars;   
   we offer it in union with the acts of atonement of Thy Virgin Mother and all   
   the saints and of the pious faithful on earth; and we sincerely promise to   
   make recompense as far as we can, with the help of Thy grace, for all the   
   neglect of Thy great love and for the sins we and others have committed in   
   the past.  Henceforth, we will live a life of unwavering faith, of purity of   
   conduct of perfect observance of the precepts of the Gospel and especially   
   that of charity.  We promise to the best of our power to prevent others from   
   offending Thee and to bring as many as possible to follow Thee.   
      
   O loving Jesus, through the intercession of the Blessed Virgin Mary, our   
   model in reparation, deign to receive the voluntary offering we make of this   
   act of expiation; and by the crowning gift of perseverance keep us faithful   
   unto death in our duty and allegiance we owe to Thee so that we may all one   
   day come to that happy home, where Thou, with the Father and the Holy Ghost,   
   livest and reignest God, world without end.  Amen.   
      
   --- SoupGate-Win32 v1.05   
    * Origin: you cannot sedate... all the things you hate (1:229/2)