From: richarra@gmail.com   
      
   Be ready and watch   
      
   "And for this very reason there is also a word of the Savior to   
   prepare us for that day, in these words: 'Be ready and watch, for He   
   comes at an hour you do not know.' For, according to the blessed Paul:   
   'We must all stand before the judgment-seat of Christ, that each one   
   may receive according as he has done in the body, whether it be good   
   or bad.'"   
   -St. Athanasius, Incarnation of the Word, 56.5, 4th century   
      
   <<>><<>><<>>   
   January 25th – St. Poppo of Stavelot, OSB, Abbot    
   Also known as   
       • Popon   
       • Poppone   
      
   Born in Flanders, 978; died at Marchiennes on January 25, 1048; his name was   
   added to the Roman Martyrology by Baronius about 1624. Saint Poppo received a   
   pious education at the side of his mother, who died as a nun in Verdun. He   
   began a military career    
   in his youth and led an unbridled life. Finding such a life less satisfactory   
   than that of prayer, Poppo made a penitential pilgrimage to Jerusalem and   
   Rome. On his return in 1006 with many precious relics (which he endowed to the   
   church at Deisne near    
   Ghent), he became a Benedictine at Saint-Thierry, Rheims.   
      
   Two years later his reputation for holiness gained the attention of the   
   reformer, Blessed Richard of Saint-Vannes, who petitioned Saint-Thierry's   
   abbot for Poppo. Today's saint was given permission to migrate to Saint-Vannes   
   to assist Blessed Richard in    
   the revival of monastic discipline.   
      
   Shortly thereafter he was appointed provost of Saint-Vaast, Arras. During a   
   requisite journey to court, Poppo became known to the emperor Saint Henry II,   
   who chose him as one of his most trusted advisers. He prevailed upon the   
   emperor to abolish the    
   combat between men and bears. Thereafter, Poppo served the church in many   
   positions: prior of Saint-Vaast, provost of Saint-Vannes, and abbot of   
   Beaulieu (which he rebuilt).   
      
   In 1021, the emperor made Poppo abbot of Stavelot-Malmédy near Liège and   
   soon the revival spread to several of the most ancient abbeys of Lotharingia   
   and neighboring territories: Hautmont, Marchiennes, Saint Maximinus of   
   Trèves, Saint- Vaast at Arras,    
   etc. Poppo ruled all these houses as a sort of superior general. He is one of   
   the greatest monastic figures of the 11th century. On his deathbed at age 70,   
   Poppo received extreme unction at the hands of Abbot Everhelm of Hautmont, who   
   wrote his vita.    
   Saint Poppo was buried at Stavelot, where his relics were enshrined in 1624   
   (Attwater2, Benedictines, Coulson, Husenbeth).   
      
   Saint Poppo is pictured as a Benedictine abbot restoring life to a man killed   
   by a wolf (Roeder). His feast is commemorated at Stavelot (Husenbeth).   
      
      
   Saint Quote:   
   Humility is necessary not only for the acquisition of virtues, but   
   even for salvation.  For the gate of Heaven, as Christ Himself   
   testifies, is so narrow that it admits only little ones.   
   --St. Bernard   
      
   Bible Quote:   
    That I may know him and the power of his resurrection and the   
   fellowship of his sufferings: being made conformable to his death, If   
   by any means I may attain to the resurrection which is from the dead.   
   [Philippians 3:10-11] DRB   
      
      
   <><><><>   
   An excerpt from his Homily 2: In Praise of Saint Paul   
   Saint John Chrysostom (347-407)   
      
   Paul, more than anyone else, has shown us what man really is and in what our   
   nobility consists and of what virtue this particular animal is capable. Each   
   day he aimed ever higher, each day he rose up with greater ardour and faced   
   with new eagerness the    
   dangers that threatened him. He summed up his attitude in the words:  I   
   forget what is behind me and push on to what lies ahead. When he saw death   
   imminent, he bade others share his joy:  Rejoice and be glad with me! And   
   when danger, injustice and    
   abuse threatened, he said:  I am content with weakness, mistreatment and   
   persecution. These he called the weapons of righteousness, thus telling us   
   that he derived immense profit from them.   
      
   Thus, amid the traps set for him by his enemies, with exultant heart he turned   
   their every attack into a victory for himself – constantly beaten, abused   
   and cursed, he boasted of it as though he were celebrating a triumphal   
   procession and taking    
   trophies home, and offered thanks to God for it all:  Thanks be to God who is   
   always victorious in us! This is why he was far more eager for the shameful   
   abuse that his zeal in preaching brought upon him than we are for the most   
   pleasing honours, more    
   eager for death than we are for life, for poverty than we are for wealth, he   
   yearned for toil far more than others yearn for rest after toil. The one thing   
   he feared, indeed dreaded, was to offend God, nothing else could sway him.   
   Therefore, the only    
   thing he really wanted was always to please God.   
   The most important thing of all to him, however, was that he knew himself to   
   be loved by Christ. Enjoying this love, he considered himself happier than   
   anyone else, were he without it, it would be no satisfaction to be the friend   
   of principalities and    
   powers. He preferred to be thus loved and be the least of all, or even to be   
   among the damned, than to be without that love and be among the great and   
   honoured.   
   To be separated from that love was, in his eyes, the greatest and most   
   extraordinary of torments, the pain of that loss would alone, have been hell   
   and endless, unbearable torture.    
      
   --- SoupGate-Win32 v1.05   
    * Origin: you cannot sedate... all the things you hate (1:229/2)