From: richarra@gmail.com   
      
   The Intimate Friendship of Jesus (2)   
      
      WHEN Jesus is near, all is well and nothing seems difficult. When   
   He is absent, all is hard. When Jesus does not speak within, all other   
   comfort is empty, but if He says only a word, it brings great   
   consolation.    Did not Mary Magdalen rise at once from her weeping   
   when Martha said to her: "The Master is come, and calleth for thee"?   
   John 11:28.  Happy is the hour when Jesus calls   
   one from tears to joy of spirit.   
   --Thomas à Kempis --Imitation of Christ Book 2, Chapter 8   
      
      
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   October 9th - Saint John Leonardi   
      
   After ordination to the priesthood, John Leonardi (1541-1609) gathered   
   a group of laymen to assist him in the care of the sick and to work   
   for the spiritual good of prisoners. Motivated by reforms of the   
   Council of Trent he founded a society of diocesan priests in 1574 to   
   carry out the mandated renewal of the council. The young men who had   
   been assisting him all became priests. The society was later approved   
   as the Clerics Regular of the Mother of God.   
      
   St. John Leonardi was also a preacher of renewal and prompted the   
   religious instruction of the young. In a letter to Pope Paul V he   
   wrote: Nothing should be untried that can train children from early   
   childhood in good morals and in the earnest practice of Christianity.   
   To this end nothing is more effective than pious instructions in   
   Christian doctrine. Children should be entrusted only to good and   
   God-fearing teachers.   
      
   He co-founded a society of priest dedicated to working in foreign   
   missions, which later became the Society for the Propagation of the   
   Faith. St. John Leonardi was also requested by Pope Clement the VII to   
   assist in the renewal and reform of several religious communities.   
      
   His letter to Pope Paul V expresses a desire for genuine reform and   
   spiritual renewal in the Church. He wrote that: “Reform must begin   
   with high and low alike, with superiors and inferiors. Yet the   
   reformers must look first to those who are set over the rest, so that   
   reform can begin at the point from which it may spread to others.”   
      
   Then he boldly says that it must begin “with cardinals, patriarchs,   
   archbishops, bishops and priest” who have a particular responsibility   
   to be guides. “ Those who want to work for moral reform in the world   
   must seek the glory of God before all else. Because He is the source   
   of all good, they must wait for His help, and pray for it in this   
   difficult and necessary undertaking. They must then present themselves   
   to those they seek to reform, as mirrors of every virtue and as lamps   
   on a lamp stand. Their upright lives and noble conduct must shine   
   before all those who are in the house of God. In this way they will   
   gently entice the members to reform instead of forcing them, lest, in   
   the words of the Council of Trent, they demand of the body what is not   
   found in the head, and thus upset the whole order of the Lord’s   
   household.” (Letter to Pope Paul V)   
      
   The church has always known the truth of the remark made by Bernard   
   Shaw: The best reformers the world has ever seen are those who   
   commence on themselves.” It is an on-going need in the Church and God   
   has always raised up prophets in time of need. We honor St. John   
   Leonardi as one of those prophets.   
      
   St. John Leonardi died in 1609 in Rome after contracting the plague   
   from those to whom he ministered and he was canonized in 1938.   
      
      
   Saint Quote:   
   The crosses with which our path through life is strewn associate us   
   with Jesus in the mystery of His crucifixion.   
   --St. John Eudes   
      
   Bible Quote:   
   Fear not, little flock, for it hath pleased your Father to give you a   
   kingdom.  Sell what you possess and give alms. Make to yourselves bags   
   which grow not old, a treasure in heaven which faileth not: where no   
   thief approacheth, nor moth corrupteth.  (Luke 12:32-33) DRB   
      
      
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   A Mirror to See Inside Ourselves   
      
   Holy Scripture is presented to the mind's eye like a mirror in which   
   the appearance of our inner being can be seen. In this mirror we can   
   see both the ugliness and the beauty of our soul. We can tell what   
   progress we are making or whether we are making any progress at all.   
      
   Holy Scripture recounts the good deeds of the saints and encourages   
   the hearts of the weak to imitate them. In recording the prowess of   
   the saints, Scripture also underlines our weakness in the face of the   
   onslaught of the vices. But its words ensure that the more the soul   
   sees of the triumphs of so many heroes of the faith, the less it is   
   alarmed in the midst of its own battle.   
      
   Sometimes, however, Holy Scripture does not only record the victories   
   of the saints but also mentions their defeats, so that we may see from   
   their failures what we ought to be afraid of, besides learning from   
   their triumphs what we ought to aim at. For example, Job is described   
   in the Bible as being exalted by temptation, whereas David is   
   represented as humiliated by it.   
      
   By this means, our hopes may be nourished by the valor of people in   
   the past, while because of their weakness we may gird on the   
   protection of humility.   
      
   The victories of the saints give our spirits wings through the joy   
   they cause; their failures give us pause through fear.   
      
   From Scripture the soul of the reader learns the confidence of hope   
   and the humility of fear. Thanks to the weight of the fear, it does   
   not have the temerity to be proud; but this fear does not cast it into   
   utter despair, because the soul is fortified in the strength of hope   
   by the examples of valor.   
      
   --Gregory the Great (540-604 AD), Commentary on the Book of Job, 2, 1   
   (SC32, p.180)   
      
   --- SoupGate-Win32 v1.05   
    * Origin: you cannot sedate... all the things you hate (1:229/2)