ST SOPHIA, WIDOW - 30 SEPTEMBER

 

ALL SAINTS CELEBRATED IN SEPTEMBER

Saints celebrated on the 30th of September

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 SOPHIA, WIDOW 

St Sophia was a 2nd century Widow. She was the mother of the Virgin Saints, Faith, Hope and Charity, who, as tradition has handed down to us, suffered death for Christ under the Emperor Hadrian (A.D. 117-138), while still children. 

Three days later, their mother, while praying over their tomb, herself passed away in peace.

This St Sophia, though the object of much popular devotion in the East, must not be thought to be the Title Saint of the world-famed Basilica of Saint Sophia at Constantinople. That Church is dedicated to the Divine Wisdom or Holy Wisdom, which in Greek is equivalent to our Sancta Sophia.

(Information from The Book of Saints, 1921, by the Monks of Ramsgate)