Friends at Court

New Zealand Tablet, Volume XXXIV, Issue 3, 18 January 1906, Page 31

Friends at Court

GLEANINGS FOR NEXT WEEK'S CALENDAR

January 21, Sunday .—Third Sunday after Epiphany, St. Agnes, Virgin and Martyr. „ 22, Monday.— SS Vunccnt and Anastasius, Martyrs. „ 23, Tuesday.— Espousals of the Blessed Virgin Mary. „ '24, Wednesday.— St. Timothy, Bishop and Martyr. „ 25, Thursday.— Conversion of St. Paul. „ 26, Friday.— St. Polycarp, Bishop and Martyr. „ 2'7 V , Saturday.— St. Vitalian, Pope and Confessor St. Agnes, Virgin and Martyr. St. Agnes is one of the best known of the many martyrs whom the persecutions of the Roman emperors gave to the Church. She was but thirteen years of age at the time of her glorious death, in 304. SS. Vincent and Anastasius, Martyrs. These two saints, though commemorated on the same day, suffered at different times and in different countries. St. Vincent, a deacon, was a native of Spain. After enduring torments that are well nigh incredible, he died of his wounds at Valentia, A.D. 304. St. Anastasius, a Persian monk, after having been cruelly tortured, was strangled in 628. Espousals of the Blessed Virgin Mary. In this feast we commemorate the providential care with which God assigned to the Virgin Mother and her Divine Child, in the person of St. Joseph, a faithful guardian and protector in the necessities and trials of their daily life. St. Timothy, Bishop and Martyr. St. Timothy was a disciple of St. Paul. He was Bishop of Ephesus, and martyr, and died in 97. Born at Lystra, Lyacoma ; attached himself about the year 51 to St. Paul, who associated him in all his apostolic labors ; became the first Bishop of Ephesus in 65, where, being opposed to the celebration of a feast lin honor of Diana, he was stoned to death. We have two Epistles of St. Paul to Timothy. Conversion of St. Paul, Apostle. St. Paul was born at Tarsus, of Jewish parents, and studied in Jerusalem, at the feet of Gamaliel. While still a young man he held the clothes of those who stoned the proto-martyr Stephen ; and in his restless zeal he pressed on to Damascus, ' breathing out threatenings and slaughter against the disciples of Christ.' But near Damascus a light struck him to the earth. He heard a voice which said : ' Why persecutist thou Me ?' He saw the form of Him Who had been crucified for his bins, and then for three days he saw nothing more. He awoke from his trance another man — a new creature in Jiesus Christ. He left Damascus for a long retreat in Arabia, and then at the call of God he carried the Gospel to the uttermost limits of the then known world. With St. Peter he consecrated Rome, our holy city, by his martyrdom, and poured into its Church all his doctrine with all his blood. St. Polycarp, Bishop and Martyr. St. Polycarp was Bishop of Smyrna. He was the immediate contemporary and friend of St. Ignatius, but nothing certain is known as to his origin or the place of his birth. Irenaeus, his disciple, tells us that he was instructed by the Apostle St. John, and appointed by him Bishop of Smyrna. About the middle of the second century he journeyed to Rome to consult with Pope Anicetus regarding the time of Easter. On this occasion he brought back to the Church many who had been led away by the Gnostics, Valentine and Marcion. It is recorded that on meeting Marcion in the streets of Rome, when the latter asked him whether he knew him, he replied that he knew ' the first-born of Satan.' He was close on a hundred years old when he died the death 'of a martyr by -the sword— having been miraculously preserved from death by fire— under Marcus Aurelius, about 166, or, according to others, about 155.