From: rich <richarra@gmail.com>

April 2nd - Saint Francis of Paula, Confessor
from the Liturgical Year, 1870

The founder of a Religious Order, whose distinguishing characteristics were=
humility and penance, comes before us today: it is Francis of Paula. Let u=
s study his virtues and beg his intercession. His whole life was one of gre=
at innocence; and yet, we find him embracing, from his earliest youth, mort= ifications which, now-a-days, would not be expected from the very worst sin= ners. How was it that he could do so much? and we, who have so often sinned=
, do so little? The claims of Divine Justice are as strong now as ever they=
were; for God never changes, nor can the offence we have committed against=
Him by our sins be pardoned, unless we make atonement. The Saints punished=
themselves, with life-long and austere penances, for the slightest sins; a=
nd the Church can scarcely induce us to observe the law of Lent, though it =
is now reduced to the lowest degree of severity.

What is the cause of this want of the spirit of expiation and penance? It i=
s that our Faith is weak, and our Love of God is cold, because our thoughts=
and affections are so set upon this present life, that we seldom if ever c= onsider things in the light of Eternity. How many of us are like the King o=
f France, who having obtained permission from the Pope that St. Francis of = Paula should come and live near him, threw himself at the Saint's feet, and=
besought him to obtain of God that he, the King, might have a long life! L= ouis the 11th had led a most wicked life; but his anxiety was, not to do pe= nance for his sins, but to obtain, by the Saint's prayers, a prolongation o=
f a career, which had been little better than a storing up wrath for the da=
y of wrath. We, too, love this present life; we love it to excess. The laws=
of Fasting and Abstinence are broken, not because the obeying them would e= ndanger life, or even seriously injure health,--for, where either of these =
is to be feared, the Church does not enforce her Lenten penances: but peopl=
e dispense themselves from Fasting and Abstinence, because the spirit of im= mortification renders every privation intolerable, and every interruption o=
f an easy comfortable life insupportable. They have strength enough for any=
fatigue that business or pleasure call for; but the moment there is questi=
on of observing those laws, which the Church has instituted for the interes=
t of body as well as of the soul, all seems impossible; the conscience gets=
accustomed to these annual transgressions, and ends by persuading the sinn=
er that he may be saved without doing penance.


St. Francis of Paula was of a very different way of thinking and acting. Th=
e Church gives us the following abridged account of his life.

Francis was born at Paula, an unimportant town of Calabria. His parents, wh=
o were for a long time without children, obtained him from heaven, after ha= ving made a vow, prayed to St. Francis. When very young, being inflamed wit=
h the love of God, he withdrew into a desert, where, for six years, he led =
an austere life, but one that was sweetened by heavenly contemplations. The=
fame of his virtues having spread abroad, many persons went to him, out of=
a desire to be trained in virtue. Out of a motive of fraternal charity, he=
left his solitude, built a Church near Paula, and there laid the foundatio=
n of his Order.

He had a wonderful gift of preaching. He observed virginity during his whol=
e life. Such was his love for humility, that he called himself the last of = all men, and would have his disciples named Minims. His dress was of the co= arsest kind; he always walked bare-footed, and his bed was the ground. His = abstinence was extraordinary: he ate only once in the day, and that not til=
l after sunset. His food consisted of bread and water, to which he scarcely=
ever added those viands which are permitted even in Lent: and this practic=
e he would have kept up by his Religious, under the obligation of a fourth = vow.

God bore witness to the holiness of his Servant by many miracles, of which = this is the most celebrated; that when he was rejected by the sailors, he a=
nd his companion passed over the straits of Sicily on his cloak, which he s= pread out on the water. He also prophesied many future events. Louis the 11= th, king of France, had a great desire to see the Saint, and treated him wi=
th great respect. Having reached his 91st year, he died at Tours, in the ye=
ar of our Lord 1507. His body, which was left unburied for 11 days, so far = from becoming corrupt, yielded a sweet fragrance. He was canonised by Pope = Leo the Tenth.


Saint Quote:
Fix your minds on the passion of our Lord Jesus Christ. Inflamed with love = for us, he came down from heaven to redeem us. For our sake he endured ever=
y torment of body and soul and shrank from no bodily pain. He himself gave =
us an example of perfect patience and love. We, then, are to be patient in = adversity.
-- Saint Francis of Paola from a letter

Bible Quote:
He who glories, let him glory in the Lord. =C2 {1 Corinthians 1:31}


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Prayer:

Apostle of penance! thy life was always that of a Saint, and we are sinners=
: yet do we presume, during these days, to beg thy powerful intercession, i=
n order to obtain of God, that this holy Season may not pass without having=
produced within us a true spirit of penance, which may give us a reasonabl=
e hope of receiving His pardon. We admire the wondrous works which filled t=
hy life,--a life that resembled, in duration, that of the Patriarchs, and p= rolonged the privilege the world enjoyed of having such a Saint to teach an=
d edify it. Now that thou art enjoying in heaven the fruits of thy labours =
on earth, think upon us, and hearken to the prayers addressed to thee by th=
e Faithful. Get us the spirit of compunction, which will add earnestness to=
our works of penance. Bless and preserve the Order thou hast founded. Thy = holy relics have been destroyed by the fury of heretics; avenge the injury = thus offered to thy name, by praying for the conversion of heretics and sin= ners, and drawing down upon the world those heavenly graces, which will rev= ive among us the fervour of the Ages of Faith. Amen

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