From: richarra@gmail.com   
      
   Of a Pure Mind and Simple Intention  (3)   
      
      As iron cast into fire loses its rust and becomes glowing white, so   
   he who turns completely to God is stripped of his sluggishness and   
   changed into a new man. When a man begins to grow lax, he fears a   
   little toil and welcomes external comfort, but when he begins   
   perfectly to conquer himself and to walk bravely in the ways of God,   
   then he thinks these things less difficult which he thought so hard   
   before.   
   --Thomas à Kempis --Imitation of Christ Book 2, Chapter 4   
      
   <<>><<>><<>>   
   December 18th - St. Flannan of Killaloe, Bishop   
      
   7th century. Legend says that Prince Flannan of Thomond was the   
   disciple and successor to Saint Molua (f. d. August 4), founder of   
   Killaloe monastery. He had been born in the fortress castle on Craig   
   Liath near Killaloe. His father, King Turlough, sent him to the monks   
   of Saint Lua for his education for the Church. Eventually, he became   
   its abbot. His late "vita" relates that Flannan made a pilgrimage to   
   Rome against the advice of his friends and family. According to Irish   
   hagiographical fashion, he is said to have been carried on a floating   
   stone to Italy, where he was consecrated as the first bishop of   
   Killaloe by Pope John IV.   
      
   Like so many Irish monks before him, Flannan was a missionary who   
   roved the countryside preaching the Good News. He founded churches at   
   Lough Corrib and at Inishbofin, and spent time on the Isle of Man.   
   Flannan laboured in the Hebrides and gave his name to the Flannan   
   Isles (the Seven Hunters), west of Lewis and Harris in Scotland, where   
   the ruins of Flannan's chapel may be found today. In spite of all his   
   toil, he managed to recite the entire Psalter daily--often while   
   immersed in icy water. Several great miracles are attributed to Saint   
   Flannan.   
      
   Although one source says that, inspired by his son, King Turlough   
   became a Christian late in life, he is believed to have started the   
   custom among Irish princes of retiring to a monastery near life's end   
   to do penance. He was a monk under the austere rule of Saint Colman at   
   Lismore. Three of his sons having been killed, Turlough asked Colman   
   for a special blessing on his family. At his death Flannan buried him   
   in the church at Killaloe, which became the principal church of Brian   
   Boru's kingdom.   
      
   Flannan was afraid that the chieftainship would fall to him (although   
   Colman had predicted that 7 kings would spring from Turlough's   
   loins--all named Brian). Saint Flannan thereupon decided to pray for a   
   deformity that would make him ineligible for the role, according to   
   Irish law. His biographer relates that immediately "scars and rashes   
   and boils began to appear on his face so that it became most dreadful   
   and repulsive."   
      
   About 1180, King Brian Boru's descendant, Donal O'Brien, built a new   
   cathedral dedicated to Saint Flannan. The church was incorporated into   
   a new one in the 13th century, restored in 1887, and is now a   
   Protestant church. "Luxuriant with ivy, Gothic in style, with a   
   massive bell tower rising from the centre of the building, its   
   elaborate, richly carved Romanesque doorway, dated about 1180, is one   
   of the masterpieces of pre-Norman Irish architecture. Built into the   
   stone wall surrounding the cathedral grounds is another antiquity, a   
   fragment of a bilingual stone cross inscribed with runes and oghams*   
   from about the year 1000" [D'Arcy, pp. 61-62].   
      
   Saint Flannan is the patron of Killaloe diocese where his relics   
   formerly rested in the cathedral next to his stone oratory. His feast   
   is kept throughout Ireland, and he also has a cultus in Scotland on   
   the same day (Attwater 2, Benedictines, Coulson, D'Arcy, Farmer,   
   Kenney, Leask, Montague, Moran, Walsh).   
      
   *The Ogham script recorded the earliest Old Irish texts from between   
   the 3rd and the 6th century. Ogham inscriptions are found exclusively   
   in Ireland, Scotland, and Wales. Mostly they are genealogical   
   inscriptions in the form of "X son of Y" on corners of large stone   
   slabs. After the 6th century, Old Irish was written with the Roman   
   alphabet, and Ogham disappeared from general but the knowledge must   
   have been preserved in some form because our knowledge of Ogham comes   
   from the chapter Auraicept na n-Éces in the 15th-century work “The   
   Book of Ballymote” (Leabhar Bhaile an Mhóta), which also contains   
   geneologies, mythologies, and histories of Ireland. Various opinions   
   exist on the exact origin of ogham. Some claim that it stemmed from a   
   cryptic way of writing runes, some say that it was inspired from the   
   Roman alphabet, and yet others hold that it was independently   
   invented.   
      
      
   Bible Quote:   
    "As a father hath compassion on his children, so hath the Lord   
   compassion on them that fear him; for he knoweth our frame, he   
   remembereth that we are dust." (Ps. 102: 13-14).   
      
      
   <><><><>   
   Meditations for Advent and Christmas 23 Our King As Our Redeemer   
      
   All mankind was, in consequence of its loss of the gift of original   
   justice at the Fall, handed over to the chief enemy of our King, who   
   thus became the prince of the power of this world, and had a sort of   
   dominion over all its inhabitants. From this slavery to Satan, our   
   King in His great mercy determined to redeem us, that we might belong   
   to Him, and not to Satan. How did He effect this?   
      
   He brought us back from the servitude we had incurred by paying the   
   price in His own precious blood. He shed the last drop of it upon the   
   Cross in payment; and this was but the final consummation of a life of   
   poverty and hardship and contempt, all of which was a part of our   
   ransom. To all this He added all the sufferings of mind and of body   
   which preceded His Crucifixion. All this our King paid for us, and   
   paid with a generous forgetfulness of self, which marks His excess of   
   love for us.   
      
   Why did He do this when He might have found ten thousand ways of   
   redeeming us without this sacrifice of Himself? It was because He knew   
   that this was, or ought to be, the most effective way of winning our   
   love, of making us hate sin, of keeping us faithful to God. He hoped   
   that, if naught else would move our hearts, at least the sufferings of   
   our King might put us to shame, and convince us of His love.   
      
   It is the nature of man to value everything partly according to the   
   price paid for it, partly according to the dignity of the giver,   
   partly according to the value of the thing in itself. What, then, must   
   be the infinite value we ought to attach to that precious blood of our   
   King with which we were redeemed?   
      
   [continued in next message]   
      
   --- SoupGate-Win32 v1.05   
    * Origin: you cannot sedate... all the things you hate (1:229/2)