From: richarra@gmail.com   
      
   How Truth Instructs us in Silence: (III)   
      
   Therefore, let not Moses speak to me, but You, O Lord my God, the   
   Everlasting Truth, lest I die and bear no fruit if I am but warned in   
   word, and not kindled at heart; lest it turn to my condemnation, if I   
   hear Your word, but do no obey it; know it, but do not love it;   
   believe it, but do not keep it. Therefore, Speak, Lord, for Your   
   servant is listening. `You have the words of eternal life.'(John 6:68)   
   Speak to me, Lord, and comfort my soul: order my life to Your praise,   
   glory, and eternal honour.   
   --Thomas à Kempis --Imitation of Christ Bk 3, Ch 2   
      
      
   <<>><<>><<>>   
   May 25th - Pope St. Gregory VII   
   (1020?-1085)   
      
   St. Gregory VII, often referred to by his baptismal name Hildebrand,   
   was one of the great reformers of the Middle Ages.   
      
   Born in Tuscany, this talented youth was sent to Rome to be educated   
   under the supervision of his priest-uncle. In 1045, John Gratian, one   
   of Hildebrand’s professors at the Lateran school, was elected pope,   
   and chose him as his secretary. John (Gregory VI) resigned the papacy   
   after a year. His former secretary, glad to unshoulder administrative   
   labors, became a monk. But he did not long enjoy the peace of the   
   monastery, for in 1049 the newly elected Pope St. Leo IX called him   
   back to serve as his business manager. The next four popes renewed the   
   appointment. Willy-nilly, Hildebrand was stuck in administration.   
   Indeed, he became the power behind the papal throne.   
      
   When Pope Alexander II died in 1073, Hildebrand, because of his worth   
   and experience, was the obvious choice to succeed him. He accepted,   
   taking the name Gregory VII, but he did so with trepidation. The   
   Church in Europe was then at low ebb. The clergy widely ignored the   
   rule of celibacy, and simony (the “sale” of church positions) was   
   rampant. Gregory quickly enacted new laws and enforced old ones   
   intended to suppress such abuses. But it was necessary also that he   
   chop out the root of these evils, namely, the pretense of civil rulers   
   that they had a right to appoint bishops and other church officials.   
      
   As long as political features exerted that control, their appointees   
   were liable to be unworthy, self-seeking men. Consequently, in 1075,   
   Gregory issued a decree forbidding any rulers to invest clerics in   
   church office.   
      
   Of course, the European rulers reacted violently to the decree. The   
   loudest to protest was Henry IV, the young, canny and avaricious Holy   
   Roman Emperor. He answered the pope by stirring up anti-papal clerics   
   and laymen against him. These staged a revolt in Rome at midnight Mass   
   on Christmas 1075, seized Gregory, and held him prisoner for several   
   hours. Henry then announced that he intended to oust the pope in favor   
   of a bishop of his own choosing.   
      
   But Henry had gone too far. When Gregory excommunicated him, releasing   
   his subjects from their feudal oaths of allegiance, the German nobles   
   threatened the emperor with deposition if he had not made peace with   
   Gregory before February 1076. Now, Henry had a keen sense of public   
   reactions. Taking the initiative, he crossed the Alps in midwinter   
   with his empress and child and only one servant, and sought out the   
   pope, who was visiting at Canossa in northern Italy. Dressed in   
   penitential garb, he stood before the castle of Canossa for 3 cold   
   days, begging Gregory to absolve him. The pope, with good reason,   
   doubted the emperor’s sincerity, but finally had to grant his   
   petition. It was a melodramatic episode in human history.   
      
   The German nobles nevertheless deposed Henry in 1077, and elected in   
   his place Rudolph of Swabia. However, when Rudolph died two years   
   later, Henry renewed his revolt against the pope, naming a pope of his   
   own, Guibert of Revenna. Gregory re-imposed the excommunication,   
   whereupon Henry led his army against Rome and after a siege of 3   
   years, occupied it. The pope sought refuge in Castel Sant’Angelo,   
   until his rescue by the forces of Robert Guiscard, the Norman Duke of   
   Calabria. But Guiscard’s troops so misbehaved that the Romans drove   
   them out as well, and the pope, for safety’s sake, had to go back with   
   the Normans to southern Italy. Thirteen of his cardinals now rebelled   
   against him. The pontiff, failing in health of late, died at Salerno,   
   near Naples. In his last moments, he said (adapting Psalm 44) “I have   
   loved righteousness and hated iniquity; that is why I die in exile.”   
   This strong but generous pope had already forgiven his enemies and   
   lifted the excommunications of all but the impenitent Henry and his   
   antipope.   
      
   St. Gregory, in a turbulent era, had envisioned a purified Church, and   
   worked all his priestly life to achieve it. He died before his vision   
   became a reality, but the movement for reform that he launched   
   eventually succeeded.   
   –Father Robert   
      
      
   Saint Quote:   
   Can the life of a good Christian be anything other than that of a man   
   nailed to the Cross with Jesus Christ?   
   -- Saint John Vianney   
      
   Bible Quote:   
   Wonder not at this: for the hour cometh wherein all that are in the   
   graves shall hear the voice of the Son of God. And they that have done   
   good things shall come forth unto the resurrection of life: but they   
   that have done evil, unto the resurrection of judgment. [John 5:28,29   
   ] DRB   
      
      
   <><><><>   
   A short invocation of the Blessed Virgin Mary, from the Roman Breviary:   
      
   We fly to thy patronage, O holy Mother of God; despise not thou our   
   petitions in our necessities, but deliver us always from all dangers,   
   O glorious and blessed Virgin.   
      
   --- SoupGate-Win32 v1.05   
    * Origin: you cannot sedate... all the things you hate (1:229/2)