July 11 – St Benedict, Abbot (Feast)

1. The Lord has given them endless glory and everlasting fame.

2. Bless the Lord, you servants of the Lord, for ever.

3. The friends of the Lord find joy in his glory, rejoicing in his kingdom.

Sirach 45, 1-6

Beloved of God and men, whose memory is in benediction. He made him like the saints in glory, and magnified him in the fear of his enemies, and with his words he made prodigies to cease. He glorified him in the sight of kings, and gave him commandments in the sight of his people, and showed him his glory. He sanctified him in his faith and meekness, and chose him out of all flesh. For he heard him and his voice, and brought him into a cloud. And he gave him commandments before his face, and a law of life and instruction.

Brethren, if you then be risen with Christ, seek those things which are above, where Christ sits on the right hand of God. Set your affection on things above, not on the things on earth. For you are dead, and your life is hid with Christ in God. When Christ, who is our life, shall appear, then shall you also appear with him in glory. Mortify therefore your members which are upon the earth; fornication, uncleanness, inordinate affection, evil concupiscence, and covetousness, which is idolatry: for which things’ sake shall come the wrath of God on the children of disobedience: in which you also walked for some time, when you lived in them.

But now you also put off all these; anger, wrath, malice, blasphemy, filthy communication out of your mouth. Lie not one to another, seeing that you have put off the old man with his deeds and have put on the new man, which is renewed in knowledge after the image of him that created him: where there is neither Greek nor Jew, circumcision nor uncircumcision, Barbarian, Scythian, bond nor free: but Christ is all, and in all.

Put on therefore, as the elect of God, holy and beloved, bowels of mercies, kindness, humbleness of mind, meekness, long suffering; forbearing one another, and forgiving one another, if any man have a quarrel against any: even as Christ forgave you, so also do you.

And above all these things put on charity, which is the bond of perfectness. And let the peace of God rule in your hearts, to which also you are called in one body; and be you thankful. Let the word of Christ dwell in you richly in all wisdom; teaching and admonishing one another in psalms and hymns and spiritual songs, singing with grace in your hearts to the Lord. And whatsoever you do in word or deed, do all in the name of the Lord Jesus, giving thanks to God and the Father by him.

At every turning of history God raises up great saints in order to strengthen the supernatural hold over souls exercised by virtue of her divine mission. The Roman Empire had crumbled down and the Barbarians had invaded the whole of Europe. Then appeared Benedict, as chief of the monks of the West. He was born at Norcia, in Umbria, in 480. He was sent to Rome for his studies, but he was already endowed with the wisdom of age, according to St. Gregory. He then fled from the world to the solitude of Subiaco, spending three years in a cave from where he attracted crowds by his virtue.

The great Roman families sent their children to him and he soon founded in the mountains tweIve monasteries "schools for the Lord’s service" where, under the direction of an Abbot, the monks learned, by the exercise of public prayer, of private prayer and of work, to forget self and live in God. St Benedict, in the Prologue to the Holy Rule, orders the examination of novices to ascertain if "they are full of solicitude for the work of God, for obedience and for humiliation."

As "idleness is the enemy of the soul" the holy Law-giver adding example to his words, showed his disciples how they were to clear lands and hearts. Uniting manual labour with constant preaching to the pagan population of Monte Cassino, he left to his sons the monastic motto: Ora et labora, Pray and work. Then, in the 7^th chapter of his Rule, he presents a ladder which leads souls to heaven by 12 degrees of humility and love of God.

Benedict is often represented holding a broken vase out of which comes a dragon for he was once given a vase filled with poisoned wine which broke to pieces when he blessed it. He is also represented holding his Holy Rule where he gives to his sons the motto "That God may be glorified in all things." At his feet a raven clutches a poisoned loaf also given to St Benedict to encompass his death. He called the bird and ordered it to carry the loaf to a place where it should harm no one. The bird obeyed, carried away the loaf and returned three hours after as if to show the man ot God that he had been obedient.

Forty days after the death of his sister St Scholastica in 543, Benedict, standing at the foot of the altar where he had just participated in Mass by Holy Communion, gave up to God his soul changed by 63 years of austere penance and of fidelity to the divine law which he kept in his heart.

"The Holy Rule," as the Council of Douai called it, has sanctified thousands of souls who, especially during the six centuries when no other important Order existed in Europe, left everything, following the example of the Patriarch of the West, "to enroll themselves in the militia of Christ" (Prologue) under the Benedictine observance. The first of his precepts recommends not to prefer anything to the worship in which adoration finds its most perect expression.

St Benedict is called the Doctor of humility. He was a prophet and wrought miracles and "was filled with the spirit of all the just," says St Gregory. By his life he powerfully co-operated in the work of redemption and his glorious death has made him the patron of holy dying.

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