From: richarra@gmail.com   
      
   On the Zealous Amendment of our Life  (II)   
      
   There was once a man who was very anxious, and wavered between fear   
   and hope. One day, overcome with sadness, he lay prostrate in prayer   
   before the altar in church, and pondering these matters in his mind,   
   said, `Oh, if only I knew that I should always persevere!' then he   
   heard within his heart an answer from God: `If you knew this, what   
   would you do? Do now what you would then, and all will be well.' So,   
   comforted and strengthened, he committed himself to the will of God,   
   and his anxious uncertainty vanished. Nor did he wish any longer to   
   inquire into what would happen to him, but strove the more earnestly   
   to learn the perfect and acceptable will of God, (Rom.12:2) whenever   
   he began or undertook any good work (2 Tim.3:17).   
   --Thomas à Kempis--Imitation of Christ Bk 1, Ch 25   
      
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   March 27th - St. John Damascene, Doctor of the Church   
   (676-780)   
      
   Saint John was born in the late 7th century, and is the most   
   remarkable of the Greek writers of the 8th century. His father was a   
   civil authority who was Christian amid the Saracens of Damascus, whose   
   caliph made him his minister. This enlightened man found in the public   
   square one day, amid a group of sad Christian captives, a priest of   
   Italian origin who had been condemned to slavery; he ransomed him and   
   assigned him to his young son to be his tutor. Young John made   
   extraordinary progress in grammar, dialectic, mathematics, music,   
   poetry, astronomy, but above all in theology, the discipline imparting   
   knowledge of God. John became famous for his encyclopedic knowledge   
   and theological method, later a source of inspiration to Saint Thomas   
   Aquinas.   
      
   When his father died, the caliph made of him his principal counselor,   
   his Grand Vizier. Thus it was through Saint John Damascene that the   
   advanced sciences made their apparition among the Arab Moslems, who   
   had burnt the library of Alexandria in Egypt; it was not the Moslems   
   who instructed the Christians, as was believed for some time in   
   Europe. Saint John vigorously opposed the ferocious Iconoclast   
   persecution instigated by the Emperor of Constantinople, Leo the   
   Isaurian. He distinguished himself, with Saint Germain, Patriarch of   
   Constantinople, in the defense of the veneration of sacred images.   
      
   The Emperor, irritated, himself conjured up a plot against him. A   
   letter was forged, signed with Saint John’s name, and addressed to   
   himself, the Emperor of Constantinople, offering to deliver up the   
   city of Damascus to him. That letter was then transmitted by the   
   Emperor to the Caliph of Damascus, advising him as a “good neighbor”   
   should do, that he had a traitor for minister. Although Saint John   
   vigorously defended himself against the charge, he was condemned by   
   the Caliph to have his right hand cut off. The severed hand, by order   
   of the Caliph, was attached to a post in a public square. But Saint   
   John obtained the hand afterwards, and invoked the Blessed Virgin in a   
   prayer which has been preserved; he prayed to be able to continue to   
   write the praises of Her Son and Herself. The next morning when he   
   awoke, he found his hand joined again to the arm, leaving no trace of   
   pain, but only a fine red line like a bracelet, marking the site of   
   the miracle.   
      
   The Saint was reinstated afterwards to the favor of the local prince,   
   but he believed that heaven had made it clear he was destined to serve   
   the Church by his writings. He therefore distributed his property and   
   retired soon thereafter to the monastery of Saint Sabas near   
   Jerusalem, where he spent most of his remaining years in apologetic   
   writings and prayer. Occasionally he left to console the Christians of   
   Syria and Palestine and strengthen them, even going to Constantinople   
   in the hope of obtaining martyrdom there. However, he was able to   
   return to his monastery. There he died in peace at the age of 104, and   
   was buried near the door of the monastery church, in the year 780.   
      
   Sources: Les Petits Bollandistes: Vies des Saints, by Msgr. Paul   
   Guérin (Bloud et Barral: Paris, 1882), Vol. 5; The Catholic   
   Encyclopedia, edited by C. G. Herbermann with numerous collaborators   
   (Appleton Company: New York, 1908).   
      
      
   Saint Quote:   
   Belief in the Eucharist is a treasure we must seek by submissiveness,   
   preserve by piety, and defend at any cost. Not to believe in the   
   Blessed Sacrament is the greatest of misfortunes.   
   -- Saint Peter Julian Eymard   
      
   Bible Quote:   
    He who hears you, hears Me; and he who rejects you, rejects Me.  [Luke   
   10:16]   
      
      
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   Saint John Damascene on Mary:   
      
   "Nestorious should be ashamed, and should place his hand on his lips. This   
   Child is God. How then can she who bore Him be anything but God's Mother?   
   If anyone does not acknowledge her as Mother of God, such a one is far   
   removed from the Godhead. These words, though it is I who use them, are not   
   my own for I have inherited these glorious teachings from Gregory the   
   Theologian."   
      
   "Let us adore God alone, the Creator and Maker of all things. Let us offer   
   to Him the worship of latria as to God who is of His very nature   
   adorable. Let us revere, too, the Holy Mother of God, not indeed as God,   
   but as God's Mother according to the flesh."   
      
   --- SoupGate-Win32 v1.05   
    * Origin: you cannot sedate... all the things you hate (1:229/2)