From: richarra@gmail.com   
      
   How Christ Speaks Inwardly to a Faithful Soul  [I]   
      
      'I will hear what the Lord God speaks within me.'(Ps. 85:8) Blessed   
   is the soul that hears the Lord speaking within it, (I Sam. 3:9) and   
   receives comfort from His Word. Blessed are the ears that hear the   
   still, small voice of God, (I Kings 19:12) and disregard the whispers   
   of the world. Blessed are the ears that listen to Truth teaching   
   inwardly, and not to the voices of the world. Blessed are the eyes   
   that are closed to outward things, but are open to inward things.   
   Blessed are those who enter deeply into inner things and daily prepare   
   themselves to receive the secrets of heaven. Blessed are those who   
   strive to devote themselves wholly to God, and free themselves from   
   all the entanglements of the world.   
   --Thomas à Kempis --Imitation of Christ Bk 3 Ch 1   
      
      
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   February 8th - St. Cuthman, Confessor   
      
   In the Sussex Downs, not far from Brighton, is the village of Steyning   
   with the church founded by St. Cuthman. He originally lived in the   
   West Country, a son of a shepherd, who spent long hours watching over   
   his father's flock. There is a legend that he had a favourite stone on   
   which he used to sit and on one occasion he drew a circle round his   
   stone with the tip of his staff and commanded the sheep in the Name of   
   Christ to remain within the circle while he went off to get food. The   
   flock obeyed his instructions and never strayed, and the local people   
   began to regard Cuthman and his stone with reverence.   
      
   When his father died, Cuthman decided to move eastwards in search of   
   new pastures, and as his mother was crippled with age, he devised a   
   kind of wheelbarrow to convey her, which was supported by a rope   
   around his shoulders. He traveled in this manner for many days until   
   one day, as he was passing through a cornfield, the rope broke to the   
   amusement of those working in the field. Cuthman substituted a branch   
   of alder for the rope and this held for some days, but when that broke   
   he decided that God meant him to settle in that place. He built a hut   
   for his mother and then began laying out the foundations of a church.   
      
   The spot is described as "a quiet sequestered place, below the Round   
   Hill where two streams meet". It was a woody area and Cuthman built   
   his church of timber, having two oxen to help him to move heavy loads.   
   On one occasion two young men stole the oxen, and when they refused to   
   return them, Cuthman made them draw the loads themselves. On another   
   occasion Cuthman found one of the pillars was bending under the weight   
   of the roof, and the whole structure was about to collapse. At that   
   moment a man of a "grave and beautiful aspect" appeared, who helped   
   him to straighten it. He asked the man who he was, and he replied, "I   
   am Jesus for whom you build this house", and then disappeared.   
      
   In the porch of the present church there is an ancient stone with what   
   is thought to be pre-Christian incisions on one side throughout its   
   six foot length. Once it was thought to be the tomb stone of St.   
   Cuthman, but now it is regarded as the origin of the place name. The   
   Saxon "Stenninga s" means the People of the Stone, and this may be the   
   sacred stone that stood in the centre of a pagan grove converted, in   
   accordance with the policy of St. Gregory, into a Christian sanctuary   
   by St. Cuthman. The stone was used as a door-step until 1938, when the   
   engravings were discovered.   
      
   The River Adur, then called the Bramber, was navigable as far as   
   Steyning, and the place became known as St. Cuthman's Port. The Saxon   
   kings had an estate here, and King Alfred's father, Ethelwulf, is   
   buried in the Church. In the eleventh century, Edward the Confessor   
   gave this church and manor to the Abbey of Fecamp in Normandy and the   
   withholding of the revenue from Steyning was one of the reasons that   
   William gave for making the Norman invasion of Britain a "Holy War".   
   In the twelfth century the monks of Fecamp built the present stone   
   church to replace the wooden one of St. Cuthman (Baring Gould,   
   Cockman, Mee)   
      
      
   Saint Quote:   
   "It is more important to remember God than it is to remember to breathe."   
   --St Gregory of Nazianzus   
      
   Bible Quote:   
   And the ruler of the synagogue (being angry that Jesus had healed on   
   the sabbath) answering, said to the multitude: Six days there are   
   wherein you ought to work. In them therefore come, and be healed; and   
   not on the sabbath day. And the Lord answering him, said: Ye   
   hypocrites, doth not every one of you, on the sabbath day, loose his   
   ox or his ass from the manger, and lead them to water? And ought not   
   this daughter of Abraham, whom Satan hath bound, lo, these eighteen   
   years, be loosed from this bond on the sabbath day? And when he said   
   these things, all his adversaries were ashamed: and all the people   
   rejoiced for all the things that were gloriously done by him.  (Luke   
   13:14-17)   
      
      
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   Prayer to the Queen of Carmel   
      
   O glorious Virgin Mary! Queen of Carmel, Mother of God and of poor   
   sinners; special Protectress of all those who wear thy holy Scapular,   
   I supplicate thee, by the glory that has been accorded thee by the   
   Incarnate Word in choosing thee for His Mother, to obtain for me the   
   pardon of my sins, amendment of my life, salvation of my soul,   
   consolation in my pains, and in particular the grace I now ask,   
   provided it be conformable to the will of thy divine Son. Amen   
      
   O Queen, who art the beauty of Carmel, pray for us.   
      
   --- SoupGate-Win32 v1.05   
    * Origin: you cannot sedate... all the things you hate (1:229/2)