SAINT FEAST DAY 20 NOVEMBER: ST FELIX OF VALOIS

ALL SAINTS CELEBRATED IN NOVEMBER 

Saints celebrated on the 20th of November

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.

ST FELIX OF VALOIS, PRIEST AND FOUNDER

Saint Felix, once called Hugh, was born in France of the royal family of the Valois. When a youth, he began to think of withdrawing into solitude out of his desire for contemplation.

After being made priest, he retired into a place of solitude, where he lived for some years with St John of Matha.

COUNSELED BY AN ANGEL OF GOD

Then, counseled by an angel of God, both set out for Rome, where they obtained from Pope Innocent III, who had likewise been divinely counseled, approbation for a new Order for the ransom of captives.

AN ORDER FOR THE RANSOM OF CAPTIVES

He gave the Order a white habit marked with a cross of two colours, as it was worn by the angel, and he named the new foundation after the Most Holy Trinity.

Soon, in the diocese of Meaux, a place called Cerfroi, they built the first monastery of the Order. There Felix received an extraordinary favour from the Blessed Virgin Mary, when she appeared in the midst of the choir, wearing the habit marked with the cross of the Order. Full of years and merits, he died in the Lord in the year 1212.

PRAYER:

O God, who by heavenly inspiration graciously called forth blessed Felix, your Confessor, from the desert to the work of ransoming captives; grant, we beseech you, that by his intercession, and liberated by your grace from the captivity of our sins, we may be led into our heavenly fatherland. Through our Lord.

(From: An Approved English Translation of the Breviarium Romanum, Burns & Oates, London, 1964)