ALL SAINTS CELEBRATED IN MARCH
Saints celebrated on the 29th of March
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 ARMOGASTES, ARCHINIMUS, AND SATURUS, MARTYRS
Genseric, the Arian king of the Vandals, in Africa, having, on his return out of Italy, in 457, enacted new penal laws, and severer than any he had till then put in force against Catholics, count Armogastes, was on that occasion deprived of his honours and dignities at court, and most cruelly tortured.
ST ARMOGASTES WAS UNAFFECTED BY THE TORMENTS
But no sooner had the jailors bound him with cords, but they broke of themselves, as the martyr lifted up his eyes to heaven; and this happened several times. And though they afterwards hung him up by one foot with his head downwards for a considerable time, the saint was no more affected by this torment than if he had lain all the while at his ease on a feather-bed. Theodoric, the king’s son, thereupon ordered his head to be struck off: but one of his Arian priests diverted him from it, advising him to take other measures with him to prevent his being looked upon as a martyr, by those of his party, which would be of disservice to the opposite cause.
HE WAS THEN EMPLOYED AT KEEPING COWS
He was therefore sent into Byzancena to work in the mines; and some time after, for his greater disgrace, he was removed thence into the neighbourhood of Carthage, and employed in keeping cows. But he looked upon it as his glory to be dishonoured before men in the cause of God. It was not long before he had a revelation that his end drew near. So having foretold the time of his death, and given orders to a devout Christian about the place where he desired to be interred, the holy confessor, a few days after, went to receive the rewards of those who suffer in the cause of truth.
ST ARCHINIMUS
Archinimus, of the city of Mascula, in Numidia, resisted all the artifices which the king could use to overcome his faith, and was condemned to be beheaded, but was reprieved whilst he stood under the axe.
ST SATURUS
Satur, or Saturus, was master of the household to Huneric, by whom he was threatened to be deprived of his estate, goods, slaves, wife, and children, for his faith. His own wife omitted nothing in her power to prevail with him to purchase his pardon at the expense of his conscience.
But he courageously answered her in the words of Job: “You have spoken like one of the foolish women. If you loved me, you would give me different advice, and not push me on to a second death. Let them do their worst: I will always remember our Lord’s words: If any man come to me, and hate not his father and mother, his wife and children, his brethren and sisters, and his own life also, he cannot be my disciple.”
He suffered many torments, was stripped of all his substance, forbidden ever to appear in public, and reduced to great distress. But God enriched him with his graces, and called him to himself.
(From Fr Butler's Lives of the Saints)
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