ALL SAINTS CELEBRATED IN DECEMBER
Saints celebrated on the 28th of December
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 THEODORUS, ABBOT OF TABENNA, CONFESSOR
This saint was born in Upper Thebais, about the year 314, of illustrious and wealthy parents, and from his expectations in the world, or from the dangers and distractions of its riches and enjoyments, he drew the strongest motives for despising it.
When he was between eleven and twelve years of age, being penetrated more than ordinary with the great truths of the gospel, on the feast of the Epiphany he gave himself to God with uncommon fervour, protesting that he had never preferred any thing in his heart to the divine love and service, and begging the grace always to be faithful in this resolution.
HE HAD NEVER PREFERRED ANYTHING TO THE DIVINE LOVE
Not to deceive himself in so delicate a point, he from that moment made it his whole study to belong in his heart and in all his actions wholly to God, fasted sometimes whole days, and spent much of his time in devout prayer. Thus he lived two years at home with his pious mother, going every day to a neighbouring grammar school.
At fourteen he obtained her leave to retire from the world, and finish his education in the company of certain holy monks in the diocese of Latopolis.
The reputation of St Pachomius drew him afterwards to Tabenna, where, by his ardour to advance in all virtue, he appeared among the foremost in that numerous company of saints.
HIS MOTHER BECAME A NUN
His mother repaired to Tabenna to see him; but Theodorus, fearing any temptations of looking back again on the world, which he had renounced, with all things in it, in order to follow Christ with his whole heart, entreated St Pachomius not to allow the interview.
The mother was edified at this disposition of her son, and took the veil in a nunnery which St Pachomius had established, not far from Tabenna, where she strenuously laboured in the great work of the sanctification of her soul, and had sometimes the pleasure of seeing her son in the company of some of his fellow-monks.
HE BECAME A PRIEST AT AGE THIRTY
St Pachomius made our saint, in the twenty-fifth year of his age, his companion, when he made the visitation of his monasteries; in his thirtieth year caused him to be promoted to the priesthood, and committed to him the entire government of his great monastery of Tabenna, shutting himself up in the little monastery of Paban.
St Theodorus went thither every evening to assist at the daily exhortation which St Pachomius gave to his monks, and afterwards repeated the same to the community at Tabenna, which he also instructed by his own frequent sermons and conferences.
STUDYING THE SCIENCE OF SALVATION
When he was going on a certain occasion with St Pachomius to his monastery near Panopolis, in Lower Egypt, a philosopher of that city desired a conference with the abbot. St Pachomius declined it, and sent St Theodorus, who with wonderful quickness answered all his questions, and solved his problems: but exhorted him to bid adieu to idle subtilties and barren speculations, and make the science of salvation his great study.
St Theodorus was troubled with frequent violent headaches, and St Pachomius told him, that greater spiritual advantages accrue to our souls from diseases and involuntary afflictions when received and suffered with patience, than from voluntary abstinence and long prayers.
THE SPIRITUAL ADVANTAGES OF DISEASES AND INVOLUNTARY AFFLICTIONS
St Pachomius falling sick at Paban two years before his death, the monks of Tabenna, by importunities and tears, extorted Theodorus’s consent to take upon him the care of the whole congregation, when it should please God to deprive them of their holy founder.
Though Theodorus had acquiesced with great reluctance, and after long resistance, St Pachomius afterwards reproved him for it, and removed him from his superiority of Tabenna.
St Theodorus accepted this discharge with joy, and voluntarily accused himself of having fallen into vanity and presumption. Theodorus spent two years in the last rank in the community, below all the novices, and with joy embraced in silence every humiliation, and practised the utmost austerities: in which situation his sincere and perfect virtue shone with brighter lustre, than in all the great actions he did during his superiority, and was beyond all comparison more advantageous to his soul, as St Pachomius used to declare to others.
HE EMBRACED EVERY HUMILIATION WITH JOY
The holy abbot died in 348, and Petronius, whom he had declared his successor, died thirteen days after him. St Orsisius was then chosen abbot; but finding the burden too heavy for his shoulders, and his congregation threatened with rising factions, he placed Theodorus in that charge, but was obliged to use compulsion; and also alleged, that it was the express order of St Pachomius before his death.
A SPIRIT OF UNION AND CHARITY WAS RESTORED
St Theodorus assembled the monks, pathetically exhorted them to unanimity, inquired into the causes of their divisions, and applied effectual remedies. By his prayers and endeavours a spirit of union and charity was perfectly restored. St Orsisius was his assistant in the discharge of his duties; the most perfect harmony reigned between them, because where there was no pride, there no jealousy could arise. They studied who should surpass the other in humility and condescension. St Theodorus did nothing without the advice of St Orsisius, and they visited the monasteries one after the other.
St Theodorus instructed, comforted, and encouraged every one in particular: corrected faults with a sweetness which gained the heart, and every one with an entire confidence disclosed to him the secrets of his soul, as to his tender father and skilful physician.
HE WORKED MIRACLES
If any one transgressed, the saint with mildness endeavoured, in the first place, to bring them to a sense of their duty, and for this he had recourse to God by prayer and fasting, means which he found never to fail him. He wrought several miracles, and foretold things to come.
Being one day in a boat on the Nile with St Athanasius, he assured that holy confessor that his persecutor, Julian the Apostate, was that moment dead, and that his successor would restore peace to him and the church: both which were soon confirmed.
HE FORETOLD MANY EVENTS
Our saint also foretold the monks of Nitria, in 353, that the pride of the Arians would soon meet with a downfall. This prediction is contained in an epistle which the saint wrote to the monks of Nitria. We have also another letter of this saint, which is an epistolary exhortation to the devout celebration of Easter, published by Holstenius in his Code of Ancient Monastic Rules. The three letters of pious instructions which he wrote to his monks, mentioned by Gennadius, are lost.
THE VIPERS
St Nilus and others relate, that once whilst St Theodorus was preaching to his monks, who were working at the same time in making mats, two vipers crawled about his feet. So careful was the saint not to interrupt or disturb the attention of his auditory during that sacred function, that he set his foot upon them till he had finished his discourse. Then taking away his foot, he suffered them to be killed, having received no harm.
THEY BURIED THE BODY, SINGING PSALMS
One of his monks happened to die on Holy Saturday, in 367, St Theodorus left the divine office to assist him in his last moments, and said to those who were present: "This death will shortly be followed by another, which is little expected." The brethren watched that night by the corpse, and interred it on Easter-day in the morning with singing of psalms.
HE WAS TAKEN ILL
At the close of the octave of that solemnity, St Theodorus made a moving discourse to all his monks; for it was their custom to meet all together in the monastery of Paban for the celebration of Easter. Our saint had no sooner dismissed them to their own monasteries, in the year abovementioned, but he was taken ill, and after a fervent preparation for his last passage, having recommended the care of the community to St Orsisius, he happily expired on April 27, in the year 367, the fifty-third of his age.
HE JOINED THE SAINTS
His body was carried to the top of the mountain, and buried in the cemetery of the monks, with singing of psalms: but it was soon after removed, and laid with that of St Pachomius. St Athanasius wrote to the monks of Tabenna to comfort them for the loss of their holy abbot, and bids them have before their eyes the glory of which he was then possessed. The Greeks commemorate this saint May 16; the Roman Martyrology on December 28.
(From Fr Butler's Lives of the Saints)
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