From: richarra@gmail.com   
      
   Out of sight, out of mind   
      
       Christ is gone away; he is not seen; we never saw him, we only   
   read and hear of him. It is an old saying, "Out of sight, out of   
   mind." Be sure, so it will be, so it must be with us, as regards our   
   blessed Savior, unless we make continual efforts all through the day   
   to think of him, his love, his precepts, his gifts, and his promises.   
   We must recall to mind what we read in the gospels and in holy books   
   about him; we must bring before us what we have heard in church; we   
   must pray God to enable us to do so, to bless the doing so, and to   
   make us do so in a simple-minded, sincere, and reverential spirit. In   
   a word, we must meditate, for all this is meditation; and this even   
   the most unlearned person can do, and will do, if he has a will to do   
   it.   
   --John Henry Newman   
      
   <<>><<>><<>>   
   October 7th - Pope St. Mark   
      
   Constantine the Great's letter, which summoned a conference of bishops   
   for the investigation of the Donatist dispute, is directed to Pope   
   Miltiades and one Mark (Eusebius, Church History X.5). This Mark was   
   evidently a member of the Roman clergy, either priest or first deacon,   
   and is perhaps identical with the pope. The date of Mark's election   
   (18 Jan., 336) is given in the Liberian Catalogue of popes (Duchesne,   
   “Liber Pontificalis”, I, 9), and is historically certain; so is the   
   day of his death (7 Oct.), which is specified in the same way in the   
   “Depositio episcoporum” of Philocalus's “Chronography”, the first   
   edition of which appeared also in 336.   
      
    After the death of Pope Sylvester, Mark was raised to the Roman   
   episcopal chair as his successor. The “Liber Pontificalis” says that   
   he was a Roman, and that his father's name was Priscus. Concerning an   
   interposition of the pope in the Arian troubles, which were then so   
   actively affecting the Church in the East, nothing has been handed   
   down. An alleged letter of his to St. Athanasius is a later forgery.   
      
    Two constitutions are attributed to Mark by the author of the “Liber   
   Pontificalis” (ed. Duchesne, I, 20). According to the one, he invested   
   the Bishop of Ostia with the pallium, (The white wool of the symbolic   
   pallium is worn across the shoulders, to symbolize the lost sheep   
   recovered by the Good Shepherd of Christ’s parable) and ordained that   
   this bishop was to consecrate the Bishop of Rome. It is certain that,   
   towards the end of the fourth century, the Bishop of Ostia did bestow   
   the episcopal consecration upon the newly-elected pope; Augustine   
   expressly bears witness to this (Breviarium Collationis, III, 16). It   
   is indeed possible that Mark had confirmed this privilege by a   
   constitution, which does not preclude the fact that the Bishop of   
   Ostia before this time usually consecrated the new pope.   
      
   As for the bestowal of the pallium, the account cannot be established   
   from sources of the fourth century, since the oldest memorials which   
   show this badge, belong to the fifth and sixth centuries, and the   
   oldest written mention of a pope bestowing the pallium dates from the   
   sixth century (cf. Grisar, “Das römische Pallium und die altesten   
   liturgischen Schärpen”, in “Festschrift des deutschen Campo Santo in   
   Rom”, Freiburg im Br., 1897, 83-114).   
      
      
   Saint Quote:   
   At the resurrection the substance of our bodies, however   
   disintegrated, will be united. We must not fear that the omnipotence   
   of God cannot recall all the particles that have been consumed by fire   
   or by beast, or dissolved into dust and ashes, or decomposed into   
   water, or evaporated into air.   
   --St. Augustine, The City of God   
      
   Bible Quote:   
    Take heed, brethren, lest perhaps there be in any of you an evil   
   heart of unbelief, to depart from the living God.  But exhort one   
   another every day, whilst it is called to day, that none of you be   
   hardened through the deceitfulness of sin.  For we are made partakers   
   of Christ: yet so, if we hold the beginning of his substance firm unto   
   the end. [Hebrews 3:12-14] DRB   
      
      
   <<>><<>>   
   A prayer-hymn for virtue:   
   A tone of pride or petulance repressed,   
   A selfish inclination firmly fought,   
   A shadow of annoyance set at naught,   
   A murmur of disquietude suppressed.   
   A peace in pressure possessed,   
   A reconcilement generously sought,   
   A purpose put aside -- a banished thought,   
   A word of self-explaining unexpressed.   
   Trifles they seem, these petty soul restraints,   
   Yet they who prove them such must need possess,   
   A constancy and courage grand and bold.   
   They are the trifles that have made the Saints;   
   Give me to practice them in humbleness,   
   And nobler power than mine doth no one hold.   
      
   --- SoupGate-Win32 v1.05   
    * Origin: you cannot sedate... all the things you hate (1:229/2)