ST JOHN OF COLOGNE, MARTYR - 9 JULY

 

ALL SAINTS CELEBRATED IN JULY

Saints celebrated on the 9th of July

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 JOHN OF COLOGNE, MARTYR 

The martyrs of Gorkum were seized, subjected to every sort of derision and outrage, cruelly ill-treated and hanged on a gibbet by the Calvinists for having defended the dogma of the real presence of Jesus Christ in the adorable Sacrament of the Eucharist and the Primacy of the Roman Pontiff over the Universal Church, a primacy not merely of honour, but of jurisdiction. 

In the place of their martyrdom there grew up a miraculous tree, with as many flowers as there were victims. 

St John was not originally one of the party, but being called to assist them in prison, he thus came to share their profession of faith, their sufferings, their death and crown (1572). In the Gospel of their feast, our Blessed Lord shows us the true means of happiness here below: "You will be happy," He says, "when men shall hate you, when they shall separate you and reproach you and cast out your name as evil for the Son of Man’s sake. Be glad in that day and rejoice, for your reward is great in Heaven." Alas! how few, in actual practice, understand this language or desire this reward!

PRAYER:

Bless, O Lord, those who give me Holy Communion, make them to rejoice in thy holy will. (St Catherine of Siena)

PRACTICE:

Show forth your faith in the Holy Eucharist by exact observance of silence in Church, especially during Mass and the procession of the Blessed Sacrament.

(From "Saints and Saintly Dominicans", by  Hyacinthe-Marie Cormier, O.P.)