From: richarra@gmail.com   
      
   September 30th - St. Jerome   
    (345-420)   
      
   Most of the saints are remembered for some outstanding virtue or devotion   
   which they practiced, but Jerome is remembered too frequently for his bad   
   temper! It is true that he had a very bad temper and could use a vitriolic   
   pen, but his love for God and his Son Jesus Christ was extraordinarily   
   intense; anyone who taught error was an enemy of God and truth, and St.   
   Jerome went after him or her with his mighty and sometimes sarcastic pen.   
      
   He was above all a Scripture scholar, translating the Old Testament from the   
   Greek. He also wrote commentaries which are a great source of scriptural   
   inspiration for us today. He was an avid student, a thorough scholar, a   
   prodigious letter-writer and a consultant to monk, bishop and pope. St.   
   Augustine said of him, "What Jerome is ignorant of, no mortal has ever   
   known."   
      
   St. Jerome is particularly important for having made a translation of the   
   Bible which came to be called the Vulgate. It is not the most critical   
   edition of the Bible, but its acceptance by the Church was fortunate. As a   
   modern scholar says, "No man before Jerome or among his contemporaries and   
   very few men for many centuries afterwards were so well qualified to do the   
   work." The Council of Trent called for a new and corrected edition of the   
   Vulgate, and declared it the authentic text to be used in the Church.   
      
   In order to be able to do such work, Jerome prepared himself well. He was a   
   master of Latin, Greek, Hebrew and Chaldaic. He began his studies at his   
   birthplace, Stridon in Dalmatia (in the former Yugoslavia). After his   
   preliminary education he went to Rome, the center of learning at that time,   
   and thence to Trier, Germany, where the scholar was very much in evidence.   
   He spent several years in each place, trying always to find the very best   
   teachers.   
      
   After these preparatory studies he traveled extensively in Palestine,   
   marking each spot of Christ's life with an outpouring of devotion. Mystic   
   that he was, he spent five years in the desert of Chalcis so that he might   
   give himself up to prayer, penance and study. Finally he settled in   
   Bethlehem, where he lived in the cave believed to have been the birthplace   
   of Christ. On September 30 in the year 420, Jerome died in Bethlehem. The   
   remains of his body now lie buried in the Basilica of St. Mary Major in   
   Rome.   
      
   Comment:   
      
   Jerome was a strong, outspoken man. He had the virtues and the unpleasant   
   fruits of being a fearless critic and all the usual moral problems of a man.   
   He was, as someone has said, no admirer of moderation whether in virtue or   
   against evil. He was swift to anger, but also swift to feel remorse, even   
   more severe on his own shortcomings than on those of others. A pope is said   
   to have remarked, on seeing a picture of Jerome striking his breast with a   
   stone, "You do well to carry that stone, for without it the Church would   
   never have canonized you" (Butler's Lives of the Saints).   
      
     Quote:   
   "In the remotest part of a wild and stony desert, burnt up with the heat of   
   the scorching sun so that it frightens even the monks that inhabit it, I   
   seemed to myself to be in the midst of the delights and crowds of Rome. In   
   this exile and prison to which for the fear of hell I had voluntarily   
   condemned myself, I many times imagined myself witnessing the dancing of the   
   Roman maidens as if I had been in the midst of them: In my cold body and in   
   my parched-up flesh, which seemed dead before its death, passion was able to   
   live. Alone with this enemy, I threw myself in spirit at the feet of Jesus,   
   watering them with my tears, and I tamed my flesh by fasting whole weeks. I   
   am not ashamed to disclose my temptations, but I grieve that I am not now   
   what I then was" ("Letter to St. Eustochium").   
      
   Saint Quote:   
   An evil thought defiles the soul when it is deliberate and consented to. Our   
   Lord placed evil thoughts at the head of all crimes, because they are their   
   principle and source.   
   -St. John Baptist de la Salle   
      
   Bible Quote:   
   I came that they may have life, and have it more abundantly.  (St. John   
   10:10)   
      
      
   <><><><>   
   An act of thanksgiving after Confession:   
      
   Eternal Father!  I thank Thee, I bless Thee, for Thy goodness   
   and mercy. Thou hast had compassion upon me, although in   
   my folly I had wandered far away from Thee and offended   
   Thee most grievously.  With Fatherly love Thou hast received   
   me anew after so many relapses into sin and forgiven me my   
   offenses through the Holy Sacrament of penance.  Blessed   
   forever, O my God, be Thy loving-kindness, Thine infinite   
   mercy!  Never again will I grieve Thee by ingratitude, by   
   disobedience to Thy Holy Will.  All that I am, all that I have,   
   all that I do shall be consecrated to Thy service and Thy   
   glory.   
      
   --- SoupGate-Win32 v1.05   
    * Origin: you cannot sedate... all the things you hate (1:229/2)