SAINT MEINRAD, PRIEST AND MARTYR - 21 JANUARY

 

ALL SAINTS CELEBRATED IN JANUARY

Saints celebrated on the 21st 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.

SAINT MEINRAD, PRIEST AND MARTYR

Saint Meinrad was a saint of Eastern France, who became when in his twenty-fifth year a monk at Reichenau, near Lake Constance. 

HE WAS ORDAINED A PRIEST

After being ordained priest, he was employed for some years in the care of souls and in the instruction of youth. 

SOLITUDE

But in middle life he felt called to solitude, and at length found a resting-place in a dense forest in Switzerland, where he built a cell and a chapel, placing therein a statue of the Blessed Virgin presented to him by a Benedictine Abbess. 

OUR LADY OF THE HERMITS

This statue came to be called that of "Our Lady of the Hermits," and the chapel itself Einsiedeln (Hermitage). 

Saint Meinrad, after several years passed there as a Recluse, was murdered by some ruffians, who thought to discover hidden treasures in the poor hermitage (A.D. 861). 

HE IS TRADITIONALLY VENERATED AS A MARTYR

On the spot arose the celebrated Abbey of Einsiedeln, still flourishing in our own day. Saint Meinrad was canonised about A.D. 1000, and is traditionally venerated as a Martyr. 

(From The Book of Saints, 1921, by the Monks of Ramsgate)

PRAYER:

Grant, we beseech you, almighty God, that the venerable feast of Saint Meinrad may increase our devotion and promote our salvation. Through our Lord Jesus Christ, your Son, who lives and reigns with you in the unity of the Holy Spirit, God, for ever and ever. Amen.