ST MANS, BISHOP AND MARTYR - 16 APRIL

 

ALL SAINTS CELEBRATED IN APRIL

Saints celebrated on the 16th of April

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 MANS, BISHOP AND MARTYR 

(Saint Mans, or Magnus, Bishop and Martyr.)

In the reign of Duncan, king of Scotland, an army of savage Pagan Norwegians, under Hacon, ravaged the isles of Orkney. 

"I COMMAND YOU TO SPARE HIS PEOPLE"

To stop the butchery of the inhabitants, Mans [St Magnus Erlendsson], the zealous bishop, met the barbarians, and when they threatened him with death, boldly replied: “I am ready to die a thousand times over for the cause of God and his flock: but in his name I command you to spare his people.” 

HIS TOMB BECAME FAMOUS FOR MIRACLES

Commending his soul to his Redeemer, through the intercession of the Virgin Mary, St Palladius and St Servanus, patron of that diocese, he presented his head to be struck off by the executioner. He suffered in the year 1104, in the isle of Eglis, one of the Orcades, and was buried in the same. His tomb became famous for the reputation of miracles, and the devotion of pilgrims. 

(From Fr Butler's Lives of the Saints)