From: richarra@gmail.com   
      
   Thoughts on the Frailty of Man  (4)   
      
      The saints of God and all devout friends of Christ did not look to   
   what pleases the body nor to the things that are popular from time to   
   time. Their whole hope and aim centered on the everlasting good. Their   
   whole desire pointed upward to the lasting and invisible realm, lest   
   the love of what is visible drag them down to lower things.   
      Do not lose heart, then, my brother, in pursuing your spiritual   
   life. There is yet time, and your hour is not past. Why delay your   
   purpose? Arise! Begin at once and say: “Now is the time to act, now is   
   the time to fight, now is the proper time to amend.”   
   --Thomas à Kempis --Imitation of Christ,  Book 2  chapter 22   
      
   <<>><<>><<>>   
   23 February – St Serenus the Gardener   
      
    (Died 307)   
      
    Martyr – born in Greece and was beheaded on 23 February 303 at   
   Sirmiun, Pannonia (modern Hungary). Patronages – bachelors, falsely   
   accused people, gardeners.   
      
   Serenus was by birth a Grecian. He left his family estate, friends and   
   country to serve God in celibacy, penance and prayer. With this design   
   he bought a garden in Sirmium in Pannonia, which he cultivated with   
   his own hands and lived on the fruits and herbs it produced.   
   One day a woman came to his garden with her two daughters. Serenus,   
   seeing them come up, advised them to withdraw and to conduct   
   themselves in future as decency required in persons of their sex and   
   condition. The woman, stung at our Saint’s charitable remonstrance,   
   retired in confusion but resolved on revenging the supposed affront.   
   She accordingly wrote to her husband that Serenus had insulted her.   
      
   He, on receiving her letter, went to the emperor to demand justice,   
   whereupon the emperor gave him a letter to the governor of the   
   province to enable him to obtain satisfaction. The governor ordered   
   Serenus to be immediately brought before him. Serenus, on hearing the   
   charge, answered, “I remember that, some time ago, a lady came into my   
   garden at an unseasonable hour and I own I took the liberty to tell   
   her it was against decency for one of her sex and quality to be abroad   
   at such an hour.” This plea of Serenus having put the officer to the   
   blush for his wife’s conduct, he dropped his prosecution.   
      
   But the governor, suspecting by this answer that Serenus might be a   
   Christian, began to question him, saying, “Who are you and what is   
   your religion?” Serenus, without hesitating one moment, answered, “I   
   am a Christian. It seemed a while ago as if God rejected me as a stone   
   unfit to enter His building but He has the goodness to take me now to   
   be placed in it; I am ready to suffer all things for His name, that I   
   may have a part in His kingdom with His Saints” The governor, hearing   
   this burst into rage and said, “Since you sought to elude by flight   
   the emperor’s edicts and have positively refused to sacrifice to the   
   gods, I condemn you for these crimes to lose your head.”   
      
   The sentence was no sooner pronounced than the Saint was carried off   
   and beheaded.   
      
      
   Saint Quote:   
   “Stand fast, therefore, in this conduct and follow the example of the   
   Lord, ‘firm and unchangeable in faith, lovers of the brotherhood,   
   loving each other, united in truth,’ helping each other with the   
   mildness of the Lord, despising no man.”   
   – Polycarp, Letter to the Philippians   
      
      
   <><><><>   
   This is the prayer St. Polycarp prayed before he died:   
      
   Lord, almighty God, Father of Thy beloved and blessed Son Jesus Christ,   
   through whom we have come to the knowledge of Thyself, God of angels, of   
   powers, of all creation, of all the race of saints who live in Thy sight, I   
   bless Thee for judging me worthy of this day, this hour, so that in the   
   company of the martyrs I may share the cup of Christ, Thine anointed one,   
   and so rise again to eternal life in soul and body, immortal through the   
   power of the Holy Ghost.   
      
   May I be received among the martyrs in Thy presence today as a rich and   
   pleasing sacrifice.  God of truth, stranger to falsehood, Thou hast   
   prepared this and revealed it to me and now Thou hast fulfilled Thy promise.   
      
   I praise Thee for all things, I bless Thee, I glorify Thee through the   
   eternal priest of Heaven, Jesus Christ, Thy beloved Son. Through him be   
   glory to Thee, together with him and the Holy Ghost, now and forever. Amen.   
      
   --- SoupGate-Win32 v1.05   
    * Origin: you cannot sedate... all the things you hate (1:229/2)