From: richarra@gmail.com   
      
   The voice of life and joy that awakens the dead   
      
      "I am the voice of life that wakens the dead. I am the good odor   
   that takes away the foul odor. I am the voice of joy that takes away   
   sorrow and grief.… I am the comfort of those who are in grief. Those   
   who belong to me are given joy by me. I am the joy of the whole world.   
   I gladden all my friends and rejoice with them. I am the bread of   
   life" (John 6:35).   
    by Athanasius of Alexandria (excerpt from HOMILY ON THE RESURRECTION   
   OF LAZARUS)   
      
   <<>><<>><<>>   
   July 31st – St. Justin de Jacobis Bishop   
      
   Born at San Fele, Lucania, Italy, on October 9, 1800; died in the   
   Valley of Alghedien, Ethiopia, on July 31, 1860; beatified in 1939;   
   canonized in 1975 by Pope Paul VI.   
      
   Saint Justin was a great apostle of Africa and the true founder of the   
   Abyssinian (Ethiopian) mission. Even during his youth in Naples, he   
   was known for his extreme piety. At the age of 18, he joined the   
   Congregation of the Mission, which is also known as the Vincentians   
   after the founder Saint Vincent de Paul. He was ordained to the   
   priesthood in 1824 and excelled at preaching, especially to the rural   
   poor because he had a special gift of making the faith attractive to   
   both the scholar and the ignorant. After he helped to found a   
   Vincentian house at Monopoli, he served as superior at Lecce (Apulia).   
   In 1836-1837, Father Justin served the sick with heroic charity in the   
   cholera epidemic in Naples. Then he was chosen by the Congregation for   
   the Propagation of the Faith as Prefect Apostolic for Ethiopia.   
      
   In 1839, he left for his mission field with a few companions. Upon his   
   arrival at Adua, Father Justin found no warm welcome. Abyssinia was an   
   unhappy country politically. Most of the country was Islamic or Coptic   
   Christians who had been in schism from the Church for many centuries.   
   Adding to the difficulties, the "Franks," i.e., Western foreigners,   
   had gained a reputation for being arrogant and heretical. Following   
   the Portuguese intransigence in the 16th century, all Catholic   
   missionaries had been excluded for 200 years. But Saint Justin's   
   attitude of courtesy as an expression of his truly Christian love for   
   each individual he encountered, helped him in the long, slow work he   
   had accepted.   
      
   He adopted the whole culture of the country, including the language,   
   and amid persecution, prison, and hardship labored with indefatigable   
   zeal that led to success in improving relations with the local   
   churches. In 1840 or 1841, he was invited by the Coptic clergy to   
   participate in a delegation of Ethiopian prelates to Cairo. Their   
   mission was to request that the Coptic patriarch of Alexandria appoint   
   one of his monks as Abuna (patriarch) of the Ethiopian Church. In   
   Cairo, the patriarch denounced the presence of Father de Jacobis and   
   intrigued to appoint one Salama, a very young and not very capable   
   man, as patriarch. Justin persuaded some of the delegation to   
   accompany him to Rome to meet with the pope and seek reunion with the   
   Holy See. The venture failed but Justin gained credit and confidence.   
      
   While he did not overcome the enmity of the Coptic patriarch of   
   Alexandria, nor the Metropolitan Salama, head of the Ethiopian church,   
   he did found missions, a school and a seminary at Guala, and named   
   native clergy. In 1846, a vicarate apostolic of the Galla was   
   established with the Capuchin William Massaia as its first bishop.   
   Additionally, his converts are estimated at 12,000, among them Blessed   
   Michael Ghebre (Gara Mika'el).   
      
   The arrival of a Western bishop and the growth of the mission led to   
   an outbreak of persecution at the instigation of Salama who issued   
   instructions "to kill Abba Jacob and all his people. . . . to kill one   
   who follows their religion is to earn 7 heavenly crowns hereafter."   
   The college was closed, Catholicism was proscribed, and Bishop Massaia   
   was forced to return to Aden. Father Justin barely escaped the   
   martyrdom that claimed the life of Blessed Michael, who died in   
   captivity.   
      
   In 1848 or 1849 at Massawa, Father Justin, now a hunted man, was   
   constrained to accept the title of Vicar Apostolic and secretly   
   receive episcopal consecration at the hands of Bishop Massaia in order   
   to help his scattered flock. Although he remained a priest of the   
   Latin rite, he was also given faculties to celebrate Mass and   
   administer the sacraments according to the ancient Ethiopic rite to   
   enhance his ministry.   
      
   By 1853, he had ordained some 20 Ethiopians, was ministering to 5,000   
   Catholics, and was able to reopen the college. But in 1860, Kedaref   
   Kassa became king as Theodore II and in return for the support of   
   Abuna Salama launched another persecution of Catholics.   
      
   In due course, Saint Justin was arrested in an attempt to make him   
   "disappear." But, after several months' imprisonment at Gondar, his   
   guards released him in a wild area from which he was able to make an   
   agonizing journey to Halai in southern Eritreak. He tried to return to   
   his flock at Tigrai, but had to remain on the coast of the Red Sea.   
   Bishop Justin's work was now circumscribed to the area along the Red   
   Sea; but this still meant exhausting journeying.   
      
   He was again imprisoned for extending hospitality to a French   
   political mission. This time he was forced to endure long marches,   
   rapid changes of climate, and a fatal fever. Again he was released and   
   attempted to return to Halai on horseback, accompanied by a priest,   
   and a group of monks and students. When he found he could ride no   
   further, he knew that it was time to give up his spirit. He was   
   anointed, his head supported by a rock in the desert, and spoke his   
   last words: "Pray hard, little ones, for I am going to die. I won't   
   forget you. . . . I am dying." Thus, Saint Justin died of a fever on   
   the roadside near Halai.   
      
   He is buried in a church at Hebo, in the far north of the country,   
   where his shrine is carefully preserved, and his memory is still very   
   much alive among the people who feel that he was one of them. Saint   
   Justin was an impressive pioneer of ecumenism as well as of missionary   
   achievement. Cardinal Messaia wrote of this man of enormous tact, "God   
   chose him to be a teacher even more by example than by words"   
   (Attwater, Benedictines, Delaney, Farmer, White).   
      
      
   Saint Quote:   
   You may dazzle the mind with a thousand brilliant discoveries of   
   natural science; you may open new worlds of knowledge which were never   
   dreamed of before; yet, if you have not developed in the soul of the   
      
   [continued in next message]   
      
   --- SoupGate-Win32 v1.05   
    * Origin: you cannot sedate... all the things you hate (1:229/2)