"THIS saint was born near Avila in Spain. From his tender years, he showed great devotion to the Blessed Virgin, and was preserved from many dangers through her intercession. He had so great a love of suffering, that he slept on a hollow board and wore a rough hair shirt, besides practicing severe fasts, and almost incredible mortifications. His constant prayer was to be allowed to suffer, and be despised for his Savior's sake. He embraced the reformed Order of barefooted Carmelites; and his example and exhortations inspired the religious with a perfect spirit of solitude, humility, and mortification. Almighty God, to purify his heart, allowed him to pass through most severe trials of spiritual dryness and desolation: but, after some time, rays of light, comfort and divine sweetness scattered these mists, and filled his soul with heavenly delights. This comfort was succeeded by other trials of various kinds, which this holy servant of God endured with invincible constancy, always rejoicing when he shared the cross of his Redeemer. It had always been his prayer that he might die in humiliation and contempt; and his prayer was granted. He died at Ubeda in the year 1591, being forty-nine years old.

The spirit of Christianity is the spirit of the cross. To attain to the pure love of God we must live and die in the spirit of the cross. Our divine Redeemer merited the graces, which we receive, by suffering for us: and it is by suffering with him, that we are best prepared for his graces. This all the saints assure us by their own example. But in the divine love, they found a recompense, which amply repaid them for all their sufferings. Impatience and dejection make ill impressions on all who witness these infirmities. Be careful to prevent them, and by your good example in your sufferings, endeavor to teach others how to suffer. Be watchful in suppressing the first motions of fretfulness and impatience, and pray for the true spirit of a Christian." The Catholic Faith by Fr. John Gother

Martyrdom of st. Clement

"He was a disciple of St. Peter, and commended by St. Paul in his Epistle to the Philippians. He was the third bishop of Rome, after St. Peter, took great care for recording the acts of the martyrs; and for his zeal in gaining many to the Christian faith, was banished by order of the emperor Trajan into Chersonesus. There he found great numbers of Christians, condemned to work in the quarries by the same emperor. To these he was a great comfort, instructing and relieving them under their severe labours. For which, complaint being made of him to the emperor, he was, by his command, thrown into the sea, where he finished a glorious martyrdom, in the year 100.

Pray for the present bishop of Rome; that in zeal and holiness, he may be a true follower of his primitive predecessors. Pray for all in affliction. And since this is a difficult trial, be careful not to bring any into trouble. Treat all with sweetness and compassion; and ever choose rather to make others easy by your condescendence, than suffer by your roughness and severity. Endeavor to compose differences, as St. Paul advises, by reference, rather than bring your neighbor to the expense and trouble of law-suits, which are seldom conducted without unchristian heats and the breach of charity. But above all, see that you bring no trouble to your own doors, by your prodigality, intemperance, or other vices. Many families have been ruined by those, whose duty it was to be their support: and who can imagine what their sin must be, who by their disorders, entail misery on their children to generations? Consider whether by your irregularities, you do not rob your wife and children. For however you may call what you have your own, it is no otherwise your own, than for those purposes for which God has bestowed it. Pray for grace to understand this, that for the support of pride, vanity, ambition, or intemperance, you be not cast out among thieves and persecutors." The Catholic Year by Fr. John Gother

"Parents should remember that the offering of a son or a daughter is not all pain and sacrifice. Of course the parting is difficult when the boy or girl bids farewell to family and departs for seminary or convent. It seems almost as though the child has been claimed by death. But the hurt that the heart sustained eventually heals. Time takes care of that. And then the blessings that a religious vocation brings down upon the home and particularly upon the parents in that home make themselves felt.

First of all, there is the feeling of assurance that mother and father have that their daughter could hardly be in better hands than in the hands of Our Lord. She has become the spouse of Christ. She has been especially selected by Christ to be His bride. Surely He will take care of her both in time and in eternity.

Good parents sometimes worry about their children. They know that they are responsible for their welfare in eternity. They have often heard that on the day of the last Judgment children who are lost because of the negligence of their parents will point a finger at their mother and father and demand that Christ condemn them for the awful sin they committed in not seeing to it that their children saved their souls.

Some parents have reason to worry, not because of anything that they have done that was wrong in the training of their children but because the children refused to follow their training and involved themselves in invalid marriages and sinful practices that drove them out of the Faith into which they had been born and baptized. Mothers and fathers worry in cases like these lest their children lose their souls.

They do not have to worry about their daughter in the convent. Her habit of prayer, the good example all around her, the spiritual exercises of her daily life will carry her to heaven when her time comes to die. Mother and father can be sure that at least one of their children is safe and that they need have no fear of giving an account to God on how her life was lived and how she was brought up from her youth.

The second blessing that follows upon the sacrifice of a son or a daughter to God is the promise of Our Lord that He will provide for the temporal and the eternal welfare of those who willingly make the sacrifice. In the nineteenth chapter of St. Matthew's Gospel the following words are to be found: 'Every one that hath left house or brethren or sisters or father or mother or wife or children or lands for My name's sake shall receive a hundredfold and shall possess life everlasting.

It is not stretching the meaning of the text too far to maintain that it refers to all the members of the family who consent to a son or a daughter, a brother or a sister leaving home in order to enter the direct service of God at altar or in the convent.

Thus, a brother who gives up his sister can apply Our Lord's words to himself. And so can a mother in regard to her daughter. And so can a father in regard to his son. The consoling part of Our Lord's words consists in this that a girl who has renegade Catholics in her family - a father who has fallen away from the practice of his holy religion, a sister who has sinned deeply through an invalid marriage, a brother who has become a confirmed alcoholic - that girl by giving up her life to God in religion can save the souls of all these unfortunate relatives of hers no matter how far they have fallen. Our Lord says that he who gives up a sister or a daughter as well as a mother and a father will possess life everlasting. Isn't that what all the members of the family do, even the bad members of a family, when they see one of the girls of the family leave home in order to enter the convent? They give her up. And God promises a great reward."

"He was of the blood royal of France, educated in great piety, and while as yet a child, accustomed to give alms to the poor, This charity grew up with him; so that being now a youth. he several times stripped himself to cover the naked, and sent from his table the choicest dishes to feed the hungry. Being come to maturity, he made the study of heaven his chief business; and having received holy orders, so to prevent his succession to the crown, he retired into a desert, where he lived in prayer and penance. After some time, being found by St. John of Matha, he with him laid the foundation of the Order of Trinitarians, for the redemption of captives, which by his zeal and good example was very much advanced. In this method of holiness and charity, he lived to the year 1212, when he gave up his soul to God.

If children are under your care, accustom them to good; that the seed sown in their tender years may bring forth good fruit, for your comfort and their salvation. Children brought up too nicely, make nice men; and in this have a double difficulty in coming up to the mortifications required by the Gospel, If your lot be in the higher ranks, learn how to employ your money and time. This saint now enjoys the reward of what he employed so well. If you abuse all to serve your vanity and corruption, is there not in this an intolerable misuse of blessings? And what recompense can you then expect, but to be cast forth into the exterior darkness?It is a reproach to Christianity, that among such numbers, who are blessed with plenty, there are so few who make a christian use of it, by referring it to the Giver.

  Pray for all in captivity and prison. You have no compassion,  if you refuse them this charity; but do more, if you can. Pray for all who are slaves to sin. Help them by your advice and good example: you save your own soul, by delivering theirs. But if by your discourse or ill example, you draw any into snares, or chains, you act the part of an infidel, and can have no hopes of salvation." The Catholic Year by Fr. John Gother

"Felix, happy lover of charity, teach us the worth, and also the nature, of this queen of virtues. It was she that attracted thee into solitude in pursuit of her divine Object; and when thou hadst learnt to find God in himself, she showed him to thee and taught thee to love him in thy brethren. Is not this the secret which makes love become strong as death, and daring enough, as in the case of thy sons, to defy hell itself? May this love inspire us with every sort of devotedness; may it ever remain the excellent portion of thy holy Order, leading it to adapt itself to every new requirement, in a society where the worst kind of slavery, under a thousand forms, reigns supreme." By Dom Prosper Guéranger

"SHE was daughter of the king of Hungary, and from her childhood accustomed to all the exercises of piety. Being married to the Landgrave of Hesse, her whole business was in assisting orphans and widows, and helping the sick. This she did, without any regard to her quality or state; judging nothing more honorable, than to do good. After her husband's decease, she embraced the third Order of St. Francis Spiritual and corporal works of mercy occupied her, even to her last moments; and by her moving exhortations, many obstinate sinners were converted to God. In prayer she found her comfort and strength in her mortal pilgrimage, and was favored with frequent raptures and heavenly communications. Being forewarned by Almighty God of her approaching death, she redoubled her fervor, and ceased not to pray, or to discourse on the life and sufferings of our Redeemer, and his future coming to judge: The day of her happy death was the 19th of November in 1231.

She is an instruction to all states; and teaches virgins, wives and widows to seek first the kingdom of God, and not let the distractions of this world be a bar to the next Her example cannot be followed without great labor and self-denial, in overcoming those inclinations, which keep the soul down, and confine it to this world. Vanity, solicitude and the desire of reputation, are powerful charms, but they look not beyond the earth; and how will this turn to a good account with them, who having but a short time to provide for the next world, consume it all in their concern for this? Think seriously of this ill management, and pray for all who are subject to it. Pray in particular for those, whose quality sets them above others, that they may have a sense of what is truly honorable; that if they take their measures from the gospel, there is more honor in helping the poor and distressed, and practicing humility and patience, than in all those ways in which their vanity leads them. What is all that honor, which will be the contempt of devils?" The Catholic Year by Fr. John Gother

Reflection." It needs only," says Father Newman, "for a Catholic to show devotion to any-Saint, in order to receive special benefits from his intercession."