ALL SAINTS CELEBRATED IN OCTOBER
Saints celebrated on the 28th 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.
ST FRANCISCO SERRANO, BISHOP AND MARTYR
Francisco Serrano was born in Guenejea, near Granada in Spain, on December 3, 1695. At the age of 18 he entered the convent of the Holy Cross of the Order of Preachers in Granada, where he made his religious profession on April 22, 1714.
He applied to be assigned to the missions of China, where the Dominicans had been present since 1587. Father Francisco spent over twenty years of intense apostolate.
Towards the end of 1746 he was arrested in the course of the anti-Christian and anti-missionary persecution, together with four other Dominicans: Monsignor Sans Jorda, Apostolic Vicar of Fukien, and the priests Joaquin Royo Perez, Francisco Diaz del Rincon and Juan Alcober Figuera.
During his imprisonment, he received the appointment as coadjutor bishop of Monsignor Sans, with the episcopal title of Tipasa.
On trial, he was sentenced with them to the death penalty on December 18, 1746.
Monsignor Sans was beheaded on May 26, 1747. The other four, however, were killed by strangulation on the evening of October 28, 1748 in Fuzhou, Fujian.
The five martyrs were beatified on May 14 by Pope Leo XIII and canonised by Pope St John Paul II on October 1, 2000, included in a larger group of one hundred and twenty martyrs in China.
PRAYER:
Grant, we beseech you, almighty God, that we who celebrate the anniversary of the death of your holy bishop and martyr Francisco may by his intercession be delivered from all evils that threaten us. Through our Lord Jesus Christ, your Son, who lives and reigns with you in the unity of the Holy Spirit, God, for ever and ever. Amen.
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