ST HENRY, HERMIT - 16 JANUARY

 

ALL SAINTS CELEBRATED IN JANUARY

Saints celebrated on the 16th of January 

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 HENRY, HERMIT

The Danes were indebted in part for the light of faith, under God, to the bright example and zealous labours of English missionaries. 

Saint Henry was born in that country, of honourable parentage, and from his infancy gave himself to the divine service with his whole heart. 

When he came to man’s estate, he was solicited by his friends to marry; but having a strong call from God to forsake the world, he sailed to the north of England. 

HE FASTED EVERY DAY

The little island of Cocket, which lies on the coast of Northumberland, near the mouth of the river of the same name, was inhabited by many holy anchorets in St Bede’s time, as appears from his life of St Cuthbert. This island belonged to the monastery of Tinmouth, and, with the leave of the prior of that house, St Henry undertook to lead in it an eremitical life.

He fasted every day, and his refection, which he took at most only once in twenty-four hours after sunset, was only bread and water: and this bread he earned by tilling a little garden near his cell. 

HE SUFFERED MANY ASSAULTS BOTH FROM DEVILS AND MEN

He suffered many assaults both from devils and men; but by those very trials improved his soul in the perfect spirit of patience, meekness, humility, and charity. 

He died in his hermitage in 1127, on January 16, and was buried by the monks of Tinmouth, in the church of the Blessed Virgin, near the body of St Oswin, king and martyr. 

(From Fr Butler's Lives of the Saints)