ALL SAINTS CELEBRATED IN NOVEMBER
Saints celebrated on the 3rd 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 HUBERT, BISHOP OF LIEGE, CONFESSOR
God, who is wonderful in his mercies above all his works, called Saint Hubert from a worldly life to his service in an extraordinary manner. He is said to have been a nobleman of Aquitaine; passed his youth in the court of Theodoric III and probably spent some time in the service of Pepin of Herstal, who became mayor of the palace of Austrasia in 681.
HE HAD BEEN ADDICTED TO HUNTING
He is also said to have been passionately addicted to the diversion of hunting, and was entirely taken up in worldly pursuits, when, moved by divine grace, he resolved at once to renounce the school of vanity, and enter himself in that of Christ, in which his name had been enrolled in baptism.
HE STUDIED TO DIVEST HIMSELF OF THE SPIRIT OF THE WORLD
St Lambert was the experienced and skillful master by whose direction he studied to divest himself of the spirit of the world, and to put on that of Jesus Christ: and to learn to overcome enemies and injuries by meekness, and patience, not by revenge and pride, rather to sink under, than to vanquish them.
His extraordinary fervour, and the great progress which he made in virtue and learning strongly recommended him to St Lambert, who ordained him priest, and entrusted him with the principal share in the administration of his diocese.
ST LAMBERT'S SUCCESSOR
That holy prelate being barbarously murdered in 681, St Hubert was unanimously chosen his successor, and the death of his dear master inflamed him with a holy desire of martyrdom, of which he sought all occasions.
His revenues he consecrated to the service of the poor, and his labours to the extirpation of vice and of the remains of idolatry.
FASTING, WATCHING, AND PRAYER
His fervour in fasting, watching, and prayer far from ever abating seemed every day to increase; and he preached the word of God assiduously, with so much sweetness and energy, and with such unction of the Holy Ghost, that it was truly in his mouth a two-edged sword, and the people flocked from distant places to hear it from him.
HE TRANSLATED ST LAMBERT'S RELICS
Out of devotion to the memory of St Lambert, in the thirteenth year of his episcopal dignity, he translated his bones from Maastricht to Liege, then a very commodious and agreeable village upon the banks of the Meuse, which from this treasure very soon grew into a flourishing city.
St Hubert placed the relics of the martyr in a stately church which he built upon the spot where he had spilt his blood, which our saint made his cathedral, removing thither the episcopal see from Maestricht in 721, which St Servatius had translated from Tongres to Maestricht in 382. Hence St Lambert is honoured at Liege as principal patron, and St Hubert as founder of the city and church, and its first bishop.
FIRST BISHOP OF LIEGE
The great forest of Ardenne, famous in the Commentaries of Julius Caesar and later writers, was in many parts a shelter for idolatry down to that age. St Hubert, with incredible zeal penetrated into the most remote and barbarous places of this country, and abolished the worship of idols; and as he performed the office of the apostles, God bestowed on him a like gift of miracles.
Amongst others the author of his life relates as an eye-witness, that on the three days’ fast of the Rogations which the whole church observes, the holy bishop went out of the city of Maestricht in procession, through the fields and villages with his clergy and people, according to custom, following the standard of the cross and the relics of the saints, and singing the litany.
HIS POWERFUL PRAYERS
This religious procession was disturbed in its devotions by a woman possessed by an evil spirit; but the holy bishop silenced her and restored her to her health by signing her with the cross. In the time of a great drought he obtained rain by his prayers.
A year before his happy death he was advertised of it in a vision, and favoured with a sight of a place prepared for him in glory.
A HOLY DEATH
Going to dedicate a new church at Fur, (which seems to be Terture in Brabant,) twelve leagues from Liege, he preached there his farewell sermon; immediately after which he betook himself to bed ill of a fever, and on the sixth day of his sickness, reciting to his last breath the Creed and the Lord’s Prayer, sweetly reposed in Christ, on May 30, 727.
His body was conveyed to Liege, and deposited in the collegiate church of St Peter. With the leave of the bishop, and of the emperor Lewis Debonnair, it was translated, in 825, to the abbey of Andain, since called St Hubert’s, in the Ardennes, on the frontiers of the duchy of Luxemburg.
MIRACULOUS CURES
The shrine of St Hubert is resorted to by many pilgrims, and has been honoured by many miraculous cures, especially of persons bit by mad dogs. The principal feast of St Hubert, probably on account of some translation, is kept on November 3.
(From Fr Butler's Lives of the Saints - 🎨 St Hubert and the stag in limestone, 15th century)
Comments
Post a Comment