From: richarra@gmail.com   
      
   Avoiding False Hope and Pride  [1]   
      
   VAIN is the man who puts his trust in men, in created things.  Do not   
   be ashamed to serve others for the love of Jesus Christ and to seem   
   poor in this world. Do not be self-sufficient but place your trust in   
   God. Do what lies in your power and God will aid your good will. Put   
   no trust in your own learning nor in the cunning of any man, but   
   rather in the grace of God Who helps the humble and humbles the proud.   
     If you have wealth, do not glory in it, nor in friends because they   
   are powerful, but in God Who gives all things and Who desires above   
   all to give Himself. Do not boast of personal stature or of physical   
   beauty, qualities which are marred and destroyed by a little sickness.   
   Do not take pride in your talent or ability, lest you displease God to   
   Whom belongs all the natural gifts that you have.   
   --Thomas à Kempis-- Imitation of Christ-- Book 1  Chapter 7   
      
      
   <<>><<>><<>>   
   February 24th – Bl. Robert of Arbrissel, Abbot   
   (1045-1117)   
      
   Blessed Robert, one of the principal historical figures of his time   
   and one of the most astonishing Saints of the Church, was born at   
   Arbrissel, now Arbressec, a short distance from Rennes, in about 1045.   
   He studied in Paris, sustained in his poverty by the assistance of   
   charitable benefactors, and became there a celebrated doctor in the   
   sacred sciences. His remarkable gifts were everywhere appreciated. It   
   is supposed that he was ordained a priest in Paris, before the bishop   
   of his native diocese of Rennes recalled him in 1085 to assist him in   
   reforming his flock. There in Brittany, as archpriest, Robert devoted   
   himself to the healing of feuds, the suppression of simony, lay   
   investiture, clerical concubinage and irregular marriages. He was   
   compelled, by the hostility his reforming zeal had caused, to leave   
   the diocese when his bishop died in 1093.   
      
   After teaching theology for a time in Angers, in 1095 he became a   
   hermit near Laval with several others, two of whom later founded   
   monasteries, as he himself did in 1096, at the site where they were   
   then dwelling in the forest of Craon near Roe. The reputation of the   
   solitaries had attracted many to visit them, and the piety, kindness,   
   eloquence and strong personality of Robert in particular drew many   
   followers; it is said that the forest of Craon became the   
   dwelling-place of a multitude of anchorites, as once the deserts of   
   Egypt were.   
      
   Blessed Robert was summoned by Pope Urban II to go to Angers to preach   
   for the dedication of a church; the Pope sent him out from there as   
   apostolic missionary, on a preaching tour of the various provinces. He   
   left his abbacy in the region of Roe and taught abandonment of the   
   world and evangelical poverty all over western France.   
      
   His gifts of grace and nature attracted crowds and effected countless   
   conversions. His disciples were of all ages and conditions, including   
   lepers; even whole families followed him everywhere. Thus was founded   
   his famous monastery of Fontevrault, not far from Cannes, to lodge   
   these flocks of determined followers of the Gospel. The men dwelt in a   
   separate region from the women; each group had its chapel, and the   
   lepers their quarters apart. Charity, silence, modesty and meekness   
   characterized these establishments, which were sustained by the   
   products of the earth and the alms offered by the neighboring   
   populations.   
      
   Until the death of the holy patriarch in 1117, he continued to preach   
   everywhere in western France. The enemy of souls could not remain   
   indifferent to all of this Christian sanctity. Persecuted by certain   
   heretics and others during his life, Blessed Robert was accused of   
   exaggeration and calumniated after his death, but the accusatory   
   writings were eventually declared to be forgeries. A calumniatory   
   letter, attributed falsely to an abbot of western France, who had in   
   other situations shown a vindictive spirit, was definitely proved not   
   to be from his hand, but written by the heretic Roscelin and   
   containing pure fabrications.   
      
   Blessed Robert is remembered for his ideal of perfect poverty, both   
   exterior and interior, according to the words of Our Lord, His first   
   beatitude: “Blessed are the poor in spirit.” He was buried at   
   Fontevrault, as he had desired to be, but his remains were later   
   transferred to a house of the Order, restored in 1806 after the   
   revolution, at Chemillé in the diocese of Angers.   
      
   The first biography of Blessed Robert was written by Baudri,   
   Archbishop of Dol in Brittany, his intimate friend, at the request of   
   Venerable Petronilla of Chemillé, widow, and first Abbess of this   
   immense and celebrated monastery, who was named by Blessed Robert to   
   replace him at his death as Superior General of the Order of   
   Fontevrault. The feast of Venerable Petronilla (d. 1149) was   
   celebrated by the Order of Fontevrault on April 24th. The Bollandists   
   remark: “Her existence was marked by many contradictions, but she had   
   the courage to pass beyond the judgment of human beings and to walk   
   without deviating on the path to heaven.”   
      
   Source: Les Petits Bollandistes: Vies des Saints, by Msgr. Paul Guérin   
   (Bloud et Barral: Paris, 1882), Vol. 3   
      
   Saint Quote:   
   We must not content ourselves with liberty and consolation and gust in   
   prayer. We must come out from prayer the most rapturous and sweet,   
   only to do harder and ever harder works for God and our neighbors.   
   Otherwise the prayer is not good, and the gusts are not from God.   
   --Saint Teresa of Avila   
      
   Bible Quote:   
   And he said to them: You are they who justify yourselves before men,   
   but God knoweth your hearts; for that which is high to men, is an   
   abomination before God.   (Luke 16:15)   
      
      
   <><><><>   
   The Wound in the Shoulder:   
      
   It is related in the annals of Clairvaux that St. Bernard asked Our Lord   
   which was His greatest unrecorded suffering and that Our Lord answered,   
   “I had on my shoulder while I bore My cross on the Way of Sorrows a   
   grievous wound which was more painful than the others which is not   
   recorded by men. Honor this wound with devotion, and I will grant thee   
   whatsoever thou dost ask through its virtue and merit, and in return to all   
   who venerate this wound I will remit to them all their venial sins and   
   will no longer remember their mortal sins.”   
      
      
   O most loving Jesus, meek lamb of God, I a miserable sinner, salute and   
   worship the most sacred wound of Thy shoulder. Alone thou didst bear Thy   
   heavy cross which so tore Thy flesh and laid bare Thy bones as to inflict   
      
   [continued in next message]   
      
   --- SoupGate-Win32 v1.05   
    * Origin: you cannot sedate... all the things you hate (1:229/2)