April 29, Fourth Sunday of Easter
Third from left: The Mystical Marriage of Catherine, Giovanni da Paolo, 1470; third from right, the head of St. Catherine in Siena's Basilica di San Domenico.
ST. CATERINA DA SIENA (Italy, 1347-1380), Virgin, Dominican lay sister, Mystic, Doctor of the Church
Caterina Benincasa was born the 23rd child of a Tuscan wool merchant, with a twin sister who died in infancy. At age 6, she told about seeing Jesus in a vision, the first of her lifelong mystical experiences, and at age 7, she vowed herself to chastity. Despite pressure from her family to marry, she joined the Dominican Third Order and lived the next three years of her life in seclusion but through her letters encouraging others in their spiritual life, she gathered an active apostolate around her. Her self-mortification to the extreme was well-known, and towards the end of her life, lived only on Communion. Early on, she started to wear a steel chain around her waist, with which she would beat herself three times a day, once for Christ, once for the living, and once for the dead. In 1366, she told her confessor she had entered into a 'mystical marriage' with Christ, who urged her to leave her private life and work in public. With her sister Dominicans, she travelled through the region advocating clergy reform and spiritual renewal, where she also gained renown for performing miracles of healing. She became interested in public affairs and started to exchange letters with public figures, including, famously, two Popes. (Her expression 'dolce Cristo in terra' for the Pope has become immortal, and was particularly dear to San Jose Maria Escriva, the founder of Opus Dei). When the Great Western Schism began in 1378 that led to two and sometimes even three rival Popes at a time, she travelled to Avignon and convinced Gregory VI to return to Rome. When he died, she supported the cause of his successor Urban VI and went to Rome at his invitation to serve at the Vatican. She died at the age of 33, ostensibly from failure to eat. More than 300 of her letters survive, along with her main work, The Dialogues of Divine Providence in which she recreates her own conversations with God. In 1375, she is believed to have received the stigmata in Pisa, but these only became visible on her death. Her remains are venerated in the Church of Santa Minerva in Rome, but about ten years after she died, her native city of Siena was able to take possession of her incorrupt head, and when it came home to Siena, her own mother was still alive to take part in the procession that installed the relic in the Basilica of San Domenico. The Benincasa house in Siena was kept intact and is now a shrine to the saint. In 1939, Pius XII declared her and St. Francis of Assisi as co-patrons of Italy; in 1970, Paul VI proclaimed her and St. Teresa of Avila as the first woman Doctors of the Church, and in 1999, John Paul II made her one of the Patrons of Europe. Notably, the Bishop of London made reference to the fact that today is the feast day of St. Caterina at the wedding ceremony earlier of the UK's Prince William to Catherine Middleton.
Readings from today's Mass: www.usccb.org/bible/readings/042912.cf
AT THE VATICAN TODAY
Mass in St. Peter's Basilica - The Holy Father ordained 9 new Roman priests from three seminaries of Rome.
Regina caeli - The Holy Father reflected on the figure of Jesus as the Good Shepherd in today's Gospel.
He called attention to the beatification today at the Basilica of St. Paul outside the Walls of
Giuseppe Toniolo,
father of 7, Italian economist and sociologist, whose life straddled the 19th and 20th centuries, and who put
into practice the principles of Leo XIII's social encyclical Rerum Novarum. Also beatified today was
Pierre-Adrien Toulorge, an exemplary 18th century priest who was martyred during the Reign of Terror,
in his hometown of Coutances, France.
21 dead in attacks on Christians
in Kenya and Nigeria
NAIROBI, April 29 (AGI) - There have been new attacks against Christians in Africa where one person was killed and ten wounded, four seriously, when a grenade was thrown at a Catholic church in Nairobi. Police sources have reported that twenty people died in an attack in Nigeria.
No one has yet claimed responsibility for the attack during Mass at the international Church of God’s Miracles in Nairobi’s Ngara district. Six of those wounded have been hospitalized at the Guru Nanak Hospital while those most seriously injured are at the National Kenyatta Hospital. A number of witnesses have reported that the bomb may have been placed under the altar by one of those attending Mass, probably an accomplice.
It is thought that the attacks was carried out by the Somali militia Shabaab, linked to Al Qaeda and previously responsible for other attacks against Christians in Kenya.
In March one person died in a similar attack in Mombasa and nine died in attack on a bus stop in Nairobi. Last week the American Embassy warned its citizens in Kenya that attacks were considered imminent.
Subsequently, Vatican Radio had this report:
Vatican condemns new church attacks
The head of the Vatican Press Office, Father Federico Lombardi, SJ, condemned Sunday’s church attacks in Nigeria and Kenya.
The first attack in Nigeria targeted a section of Bayero University's campus in the city of Kano where churches hold Sunday services, with gunmen killing at least 16 people and wounding at least 22 others. Later, gunmen open fire at a Church of Christ chapel, killing five people.
The attacks are blamed on the Islamic terrorist group Boko Haram, which wants to introduce strict Sharia law in the country.
Meanwhile, Al-Qaida-linked al-Shabab militants from Somalia are blamed for a grenade attack on a church in Nairobi, Kenya. One person died and 15 people were wounded.
Father Lombardi called the terrorist attacks “horrific” and “dispicable”. He also called on the local population not to yield to the temptations of hate. He expressed the Holy See’s closeness to the communities suffering from what he called “hideous violence”, which they experience as they “peacefully celebrate a faith which proclaims love and peace for all.”
[Modificato da TERESA BENEDETTA 30/04/2012 11:49]