GLEANINGS FOR NEXT WEEK'S CALENDAR

New Zealand Tablet, Volume XXXV, Issue 49, 5 December 1907, Page 3

GLEANINGS FOR NEXT WEEK'S CALENDAR

Decemiber 8, SunJdaiy.— .Second Sunday in Advent. The Imimaculate Conception of the Blessed Virgin Mary. „ 9, Mondaiy.— St. Eutychian, Pope and Martyr. „ 10, Tuesday.— Octave of St. Francis Xavier. „ 11, Wednesday. — St. Damasus 1., Pope and Confessor. „ 12, Thursday.— St. Melchiades, Pope and Martyr. „ 13, Friday.— St. Lucy; -Virgin and Martyr. „ 14, Saturday.— Translation of the Holy House of Loreto.

n ■ Immaculate Conception cf the Blessed Virgin Mary.

Her Immaculate Conception was the first of the priviileges ,by which the Blessed Virgin was prepared for the dignity of Mother of God. This privilege signifies that Mary never contracted the stain of original sin 1 ; that her soul, in the first moment of its union with her body, was pure and spotless. "She., was thus excepted from the universal doom, in virtue of which every member of the human race enters the world stained by Adam's sin. This doctrine, so admirably in keeping with what the holiness of Mary's Son required, though expressed more or less explicitly in every age of the ■Church's history, Wf}S not formally defined until! the year 1854.

St. Damasus, Pope and Confessor.

St. Damasus was sixty years of age when raised to the pontifical throne in 366. His profound learning, fervent piety, and zeal in maintaining the purity of the faith, and rejecting the false interpretations which various heretics endeavored to put upon the teaching of Christ, have caused him to be regarded as one of the most able and illustrious of the early Pontiffs. He- died in 384.

St. Melchiades, Pope and Martyr.

St. Melchiades was Pope from 311 to 314. He had the happiness of witnessing the triumph of Christianity, which followed the accession of Constantine. His death was peaceful, but he is honored as a martyr on account of his previous sufferings in the persecutions.