ALL SAINTS CELEBRATED IN FEBRUARY
Saints celebrated on the 29th of February
Prayer to the Angels and the Saints
Heavenly Father, in praising Your Angels and Saints we praise Your glory, for by honouring them we honour You, their Creator. Their splendour shows us Your greatness, which infinitely surpasses that of all creation.
In Your loving providence, You saw fit to send Your Angels to watch over us. Grant that we may always be under their protection and one day enjoy their company in heaven.
Heavenly Father, You are glorified in Your Saints, for their glory is the crowning of Your gifts. You provide an example for us by their lives on earth, You give us their friendship by our communion with them, You grant us strength and protection through their prayer for the Church, and You spur us on to victory over evil and the prize of eternal glory by this great company of witnesses.
Grant that we who aspire to take part in their joy may be filled with the Spirit that blessed their lives, so that, after sharing their faith on earth, we may also experience their peace in heaven. Amen.
SAINT OSWALD, ARCHBISHOP OF YORK
Saint Oswald was nephew of St Odo, archbishop of Canterbury, and to Oskitell, bishop first of Dorcester, afterwards of York. He was educated by St Odo, and made dean of Winchester; but passing into France, took the monastic habit at Fleury. Being recalled to serve the church, he succeeded St Dunstan in the see of Worcester about the year 959.
He shone as a bright star in this dignity, and established a monastery of monks at Westberry, a village in his diocese. He was employed by duke Aylwin in superintending his foundation of the great monastery of Ramsey, in an island formed by marshes and the River Ouse in Huntingdonshire, in 972.
HE WAS MADE ARCHBISHOP OF YORK
St Oswald was made archbishop of York in 974, and he dedicated the church of Ramsey under the names of the Blessed Virgin, St Benedict, and all holy virgins.
St Oswald was almost always occupied in visiting his diocese, preaching without intermission, and reforming abuses. He was a great encourager of learning and learned men. St Dunstan obliged him to retain the see of Worcester with that of York. Whatever intermission his function allowed him he spent at Saint Mary’s, a church and monastery of Benedictines, which he had built at Worcester, where he joined with the monks in their monastic exercises.
HUMILITY AND CHARITY
This church from that time became the cathedral. The saint, to nourish in his heart the sentiments of humility and charity, had everywhere twelve poor persons at his table, whom he served, and also washed and kissed their feet. After having sat thirty-three years he fell sick at St Mary’s in Worcester, and having received the Extreme-unction and Viaticum, continued in prayer, repeating often, "Glory be to the Father," etc., with which words he expired amidst his monks, on February 29, 992.
(Information from Fr Butler's Lives of the Saints)
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