Saints celebrated on the 2nd of May
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 ANTONINUS, ARCHBISHOP OF FLORENCE
Saint Antoninus was Archbishop of Florence, born at Florence, March 1, 1389; died May 2, 1459. His parents, Niccolò and Thomasina Pierozzi, were in high standing, Niccolò being a notary of the Florentine Republic.
HE JOINED THE DOMINICANS
At the age of fifteen (1404) Antoninus applied to Blessed John Dominic, the great Italian religious reformer of the period, then at the Convent of Santa Maria Novella in Florence, for admission to the Dominican Order. It was not until a year later that he was accepted, and he was the first to receive the habit for the Convent of Fiesole about to be constructed by Bl. John Dominic.
HE WAS SENT TO CORTONA
With Fra Angelico and Fra Bartolomeo, the one to become famous as a painter, the other as a miniaturist, he was sent to Cortona to make his novitiate under Blessed Lawrence of Ripafratta.
Upon the completion of his year in the novitiate, he returned to Fiesole, where he remained until 1409, when with his brethren, all faithful adherents of Pope Gregory XII, he was constrained by the Florentines, who had refused obedience, to take shelter in the Convent of Foligno.
A ZEALOUS REFORMER
A few years later he began his career as a zealous promoter of the reforms inaugurated by Bl. John Dominic. In 1414 he was vicar of the convent of Foligno, thenin turn sub-prior and prior of the convent of Cortona, and later prior of the convents of Rome (Minerva), Naples (Saint Peter Martyr), Gaeta, Sienna,and Fiesole (several times).
THE CONVENT OF ST MARK
From 1433 to 1446 he was vicar of the Tuscan Congregation formed by Blessed John Dominic of convents embracing a more rigorous discipline. During this period he established (1436) the famous convent of St Mark in Florence, where he formed a remarkable community from the brethren of the convent of Fiesole. It was at this time also that he built with the munificent aid of Cosimo de’ Medici, the adjoining church, at the consecration of which Pope Eugene IV assisted (Epiphany, 1441). As a theologian he took part in the Council of Florence (1439) and gave hospitality in St Mark’s to the Dominican theologians called to the council by Eugene IV.
THE ARCHBISHOPRIC OF FLORENCE
Despite all the efforts of St Antoninus to escape ecclesiastical dignities, he was forced by Eugene IV, who had personal knowledge of his saintly character and administrative ability, to accept the Archbishopric of Florence. He was consecrated in the convent of Fiesole, March 13, 1446, and immediately took possession of the see over which he ruled until his death.
HIS DUTIES
As he had laboured in the past for the upbuilding of the religious life throughout his Order, so he henceforth laboured for it in his diocese, devoting himself to the visitation of parishes and religious communities, the remedy of abuses, the strengthening of discipline, the preaching of the Gospel, the amelioration of the condition of the poor, and the writing of books for clergy and laity.
These labours were interrupted several times that he might act as ambassador for the Florentine Republic. Ill health prevented him from taking part in an embassy to the emperor in 1451, but in 1455 and again in 1458 he was at the head of embassies sent by the government to the Supreme Pontiff. He was called by Eugene IV to assist him in his dying hours.
He was frequently consulted by Nicholas V on questions of Church and State, and was charged by Pius II to undertake, with several cardinals, the reform of the Roman Court. When his death occurred, May 2, 1459, Pius II gave instructions for the funeral, and presided at it eight days later. He was canonised by Adrian VI, May 31, 1523.
HIS WRITINGS
The literary productions of St Antoninus, while giving evidence of the eminently practical turn of his mind, show that he was a profound student of history and theology. His principal work is the “Summa Theologica Moralis, partibus IV distincta”, written shortly before his death, which marked a new and very considerable development in moral theology. It also contains a fund of matter for the student of the history of the fifteenth century. So well developed are its juridical elements that it has been published under the title of Juris Pontificii et Caesarei Summa”.
A DISTORTION OF A PART OF HIS "SUMMA"
An attempt was lately made by Crohns to trace the fundamentals principles of misogony, so manifest in the “Witchammer” of the German Inquisitors, to this work of Antoninus. But Paulus (Die Verachtung der Frau beim hl. Antonin, in Historisch-Politische Blätter, 1904, pp. 812-830) has shown more clearly than several others, especially the Italian writers, that this hypothesis is untenable, because based on a reading of only a part of the “Summa” of Antoninus. Within fifty years after the first appearance of the work (Venice, 1477), fifteen editions were printed at Venice, Spires, Nuremberg, Strasburg, Lyons, and Basle. Other editions appeared in the following century. In 1740 it was published at Verona in 4 folio volumes edited by P. Ballerini; and in 1841, at Florence by Mamachi and Remedelli, O.P.
THE MANUALS FOR CONFESSORS AND PENITENTS
Of considerable importance are the manuals for confessors and penitents containing abridgments, reproductions, and translations from the “Summa” and frequently published in the fifteenth and sixteenth centuries under the name of St Antoninus.
An unsuccessful attempt has been made to show that he was not the author of the Italian editions. At the most is should be granted that he committed to others the task of editing one or two. The various editions and titles of the manuals have caused confusion, and made it appear that there were more than four distinct works.
HIS LETTERS
A careful distinction and classification is given by Mandonnet in the “Dictionnaire de théologie catholique”. Of value as throwing light upon the home life of his time are his treatises on Christian life written for women of the Medici family and first published in the last century under the titles: “Opera a ben vivere... Con altri ammaestramenti”, ed. Father Palermo, one vol. (Florence, 1858) “Regola di vita cristiana”, one vol. (Florence, 1866). His letters (Lettere) were collected and edited, some for the first time by Tommaso Corsetto, O.P., and published in one volume, at Florence, 1859.
HIS HISTORY OF THE WORLD
Under the title, “Chronicon partibus tribus distincta ab initio mundi ad MCCCLX” (published also under the titles “Chronicorum opus” and “Historiarum opus”), he wrote a general history of the world with the purpose of presenting to his readers a view of the workings of divine providence.
While he did not give way to his imagination or colour facts, he often fell into the error, so common among the chroniclers of his period, of accepting much that should historical criticism has since rejected as untrue or doubtful. But this can be said only of those parts in which he treated of early history. When writing of the events and politics of his own age he exercised a judgment that has been of the greatest value to later historians. The history was published at Venice, 1474-79, in four volumes of his “Opera Omnia” (Venice, 1480; Nuremberg, 1484; Basle, 1491; Lyons, 1517, 1527, 1585, 1586,1587).
THE VOLUME OF SERMONS
A work on preaching (De arte et vero modo praedicandi) ran through four editions at the close of the fifteenth century. The volume of sermons (Opus quadragesimalium et de sanctis sermonum, sive flos florum) is the work of another, although published under the name of St Antoninus.
(From Catholic Encyclopedia, 1913)
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ST ANTONINO, ARCHBISHOP OF FLORENCE
Saint Antonino, A.D. 1461, was born in Florence of noble parents, and early showed a pious, thoughtful disposition. In his childhood he would spend hours in prayer before a crucifix, still kept in the Church of S. Michele.
He was very anxious to enter the Dominican convent at Fiesole, and, after putting him to some severe tests , the Prior consented.
Here he soon became noted for his talents, as well as for his devotion and humility, and here also he became acquainted with Fra Angelico, then a brother in the convent. When, some time later, the Pope offered the archbishopric of Florence to Fra Angelico, he declined it, feeling himself unequal to the task, but begged that it might be given to Antonino instead.
The Pope granted his prayer, and Antonino fully justified his friend's confidence, for he filled his high office with the greatest wisdom and prudence, and devoted his whole life to good works. He was particularly careful of the poor, depriving himself of all but bare necessaries for their sake; and some of the charitable institutions he organised exist to this day . He died at the age of seventy, to the great grief of all his people, and was buried in the convent of St Mark.
(Saints and their symbols, E. A. Greene; Sampson, Low, Marston, Searle, and Rivington; London, 1881)
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