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SAINT FEAST DAY 19 NOVEMBER: ST MECHTILDE, ABBESS

 

ALL SAINTS CELEBRATED IN NOVEMBER 

Saints celebrated on the 19th 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 MECHTILDE, ABBESS

Saint Mechtilde (Matilda of Hackeborn-Wippra) was a Benedictine; born in 1240 or 1241 at the ancestral castle of Helfta, near Eisleben, Saxony.

She belonged to one of the noblest and most powerful Thuringian families, while here sister was the saintly and illustrious Abbess Gertrude of Hackeborn. 

"SHE WILL END HER DAYS IN A GOOD OLD AGE"

So fragile was she at birth, that the attendants, fearing she might die unbaptised, hurried her off to the priest who was just then preparing to say Mass. He was a man of great sanctity, and after baptising the child, uttered these prophetic words: "What do you fear? This child most certainly will not die, but she will become a saintly religious in whom God will work many wonders, and she will end her days in a good old age." 

When she was seven years old, having been taken by her mother on a visit to her elder sister Gertrude, then a nun in the monastery of Rodardsdorf, she became so enamoured of the cloister that her pious parents yielded to her entreaties and, acknowledging the workings of grace, allowed her to enter the alumnate.

SHE WISHED TO ENTER THE MONASTERY

Here, being highly gifted in mind as well as in body, she made remarkable progress in virtue and learning.

Ten years later (1258) she followed her sister, who, now abbess, had transferred the monastery to an estate at Helfta given her by her brothers Louis and Albert. 

HUMILITY, FERVOUR, AND AMIABILITY

As a nun, Mechtilde was soon distinguished for her humility, her fervour, and that extreme amiability which had characterised her from childhood and which, like piety, seemed hereditary. 

While still very young, she became a valuable helpmate to Abbess Gertrude, who entrusted to her direction the alumnate and the choir. 

ST GERTRUDE'S ARRIVAL

Mechtilde was fully equipped for her task when, in 1261, God committed to her prudent care a child of five who was destined to shed lustre upon the monastery of Helfta. 

This was that Gertrude who in later generations became known as St Gertrude the Great. 

DIVINE PRAISE WAS THE KEYNOTE OF HER LIFE

Gifted with a beautiful voice, Mechtilde also possessed a special talent for rendering the solemn and sacred music over which she presided as domna cantrix. 

All her life she held this office and trained the choir with indefatigable zeal. Indeed, Divine praise was the keynote of her life as it is of her book; in this she never tired, despite her continual and severe physical sufferings. 

Richly endowed, naturally and supernaturally, ever gracious, beloved of all who came within the radius of her saintly and charming personality, there is little wonder that this cloistered virgin should strive to keep hidden her wondrous life. 

THEY CONSULTED HER ON SPIRITUAL MATTERS

Souls thirsting for consolation or groping for light sought her advice; learned Dominicans consulted her on spiritual matters. At the beginning of her own mystic life it was from St Mechtilde that St Gertrude the Great learnt that the marvellous gifts lavished upon her were from God.

Only in her fiftieth year did St Mechtilde learn that the two nuns in whom she had especially confided had noted down the favours granted her, and, moreover, that St Gertrude had nearly finished a book on the subject. 

St Mechtilde died in the monastery of Helfta, November 19, 1298. Immediately after her death it was made public, and copies were rapidly multiplied, owing chiefly to the widespread influence of the Friars Preachers. 

With that of St Gertrude, the body of St Mechtilde most probably still reposes at Old Helfta though the exact spot is unknown. 

(Excerpts from "Catholic Encyclopedia", 1913)

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