BL. PHILIPPA, VIRGIN - 15 OCTOBER

 

ALL SAINTS CELEBRATED IN OCTOBER 

Saints celebrated on the 15th of October

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.

BL. PHILIPPA, VIRGIN 

Blessed Philippa, surnamed Chante-Milan, is venerated at Vienne (Vienna Allobrogum) in the Dauphiné. 

The Bollandists were the first to publish her biography, which was written by a contemporary. 

Born at the Changy Castle in Forez to noble parents, John of Chante-Milan and Joanna of Vernay, she lost her father and mother in her youth. But the mother had implanted in her the seeds of piety,  especially a tender veneration of the holy Mother of God. The then fifteen-year-old virgin sought nothing but the love and pleasure of God. 

Her decision to remain a virgin at all times, while praying and fasting, gradually led to the vow she made at La Rochelle (without joining a monastery) at the age of twenty. Soon after, she went to Vienne, where she spent the rest of her pious life. 

She had only kept so much of her parents' fortune as was necessary for her most basic living. Regarding her daily sustenance, she restrained herself as much as possible in order to be able to support the poor and sick, whom she also gladly visited and comforted.

To regularly refresh her spirit, she often went to Annecy on pilgrimages to see the image of Our Lady of Grace. For the jubilee of 1450, she even made a barefooted pilgrimage to Rome. 

A year later she was seized with a plague-like illness, which resulted in her happy death. The reputation of the numerous miracles that happened at her grave meant that her veneration by the people was far ahead of the ecclesiastical approval, which was only pronounced by Pope Urban VIII in 1625.

(Information from Stadler's Complete Encyclopedia of Saints)