"Hail, holy Joseph, hail! Chaste spouse of Mary, hail!" begins a well-loved devotional hymn, one of the hymns we sing in honor of St. Joseph on his feasts and on Wednesdays throughout the year. Today is one of great conventual joy. The silence and austerity of Lenten disciplines give way to the celebration of the Solemnity. Even the bright flowers on the altar proclaim the Church's veneration of so great a saint.
The saints, friends of God and our friends, traveled this earthly journey before us and are ever ready to help us on our path to heaven.
Meménto homo, + quia pulvis es, et in púlverim revertéris.
Remember, man, + that thou art dust, and unto dust thou shalt return. "See that you despise not one of these little ones: for I say to you, that their angels in heaven always see the face of my Father who is in heaven." Mt. 18:10
"How poor a life in which there is not thirst. Craving and longing, and the restlessness which goes with them are a sort of consolation in themselves, and a hint of likeness with Him; and it is craving and longing, more than anything else, which makes the difference between one's good and bad days." - from Notes of a Meditation by Mother Janet Stuart
"...The souls of the just are in the hand of God, and no torment shall touch them. They seemed, in the view of the foolish, to be dead; and their passing away was thought an affliction and their going forth from us, utter destruction. But they are in peace."
"Agatha went to prison radiant with joy and with head held high as though
invited to a festive banquet. And she commended her agony to the Lord in prayer." Our vowed life is a life lived in imitation of Christ's life. Fr. Louis Colin writes about religious life, "Devised by the sovereign Wisdom, from all eternity, proposed by the Master to His disciples, it is one of the exquisite fruits of the Redemption: a vigorous and immortal offshoot growing at the very foot of the Tree of the Cross, watered and nourished by the Blood of Jesus."
“To hope that any other will please me does wrong to my Spouse. I will be his who first chose me for himself." St. Agnes
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