The Lord has truly risen, alleluia.
Year: A(I). Psalm week: 4. Liturgical Colour: White.
Other saints: St Asaph
Wales
He was a monk of the monastery at Llanelwy, founded by St Kentigern. He was consecrated bishop in 573, and the town of Llanelwy (as well as the diocese) is called St Asaph in his honour. See also the articles in
Wikipedia and the
Catholic Encyclopaedia.
Other saints: Blessed Edmund Rice (1762 - 1844)
Ireland
Following the death of his wife in 1789, he devoted himself to prayer and good works, in particular to the education of the poor in his home town of Waterford: the children being taught were so poor that they needed to be clothed and fed as well. He founded schools, and undertook the training of teachers. In 1808 he and six companions took religious vows. This was the nucleus of the Presentation Brothers, who continue to this day. The Christian Brothers share the same root: the two congregations separated in the 1820s. See the article in
Wikipedia.
Other saints: St Richard Reynolds (- 1535)
Plymouth
Richard Reynolds is thought to have come from Pinhoe in Exeter, and was a Bridgettine monk of Syon Abbey on the Thames. He suffered martyrdom with the Carthusians at Tyburn on May 4th 1535, for refusing to take the oath of royal supremacy under Henry VIII. He was known for his personal holiness, and was one of the forty martyrs canonised by Pope Paul VI in 1970. Syon Abbey, one of the great medieval monasteries, was dissolved in 1539 by Henry. The expelled community moved from place to place in France and Spain, finally settling in Lisbon in 1594. This same community moved from Lisbon back to England in 1861, settling first in Spetisbury, Dorset, then in Chudleigh, and finally in 1925 in South Brent. The community remained here until the closure of Syon Abbey in 2011.
Other saints: St Angelus (1185-c.1220)
5 May (where celebrated)
The history of Angelus belongs to the time of the first Carmelites of the 13th century, a time when the histories of holy people were expressed in legend and myth that encouraged and taught the faithful. Angelus is remembered as one of the hermits who spent time with the founding community of hermits on Mount Carmel in the Holy Land. The legends attribute to Angelus miracles of curing the sick, calling down fire, making an axe head float and raising the dead. These images evoke the echoes of the deeds of Elijah and Elisha, the inspirational figures of the original Carmelite hermits. It appears that the medieval chronicler writing about Angelus, honoured him for a personality and life that closely imitated these Biblical Carmelite role models.
Angelus did not remain at Mount Carmel, but travelled to Sicily in 1219, according to the legends. He would have been one of the first Carmelites to arrive in Europe and living as an itinerant preacher, as no Carmelite communities had yet been established in Europe. Another account describes Angelus’ travels to Rome, where we are told he met with both St Francis and St Dominic. This meeting of three representatives from the mendicant orders became a popular subject for artists in later times, with each one identified by his distinctive habit.
Reports tell of Angelus receiving a martyr’s death in Sicily in the year 1220, where today he continues to be revered as a great saint. Angelus had spoken out against the immorality of a Sicilian nobleman, who then swore to punish Angelus. While he was preaching a mob attacked him. He later died from several stab wounds, while praying for his attackers. The memory of St Angelus embodies the historical movement of the Carmelites from their hermit home on Mount Carmelite to their mendicant beginnings in Europe.
About the author of the Second Reading in today's Office of Readings:
Second Reading: St Maximus of Turin (- 420?)
Maximus was born in the late 4th century in northern Italy. He is considered to have been the first Archbishop of Turin, and historians put his death around 420, although a wide range of dates have been proposed.
A large number of homilies, sermons and treatises by Maximus survive, covering the seasons of the Church’s year and also the feasts of particular saints. Their ornate late-Imperial style is not always to modern taste, but they are often short and to the point and they provide valuable evidence of Christian practice and belief at that time.
Liturgical colour: white
White is the colour of heaven. Liturgically, it is used to celebrate feasts of the Lord; Christmas and Easter, the great seasons of the Lord; and the saints. Not that you will always see white in church, because if something more splendid, such as gold, is available, that can and should be used instead. We are, after all, celebrating.
In the earliest centuries all vestments were white – the white of baptismal purity and of the robes worn by the armies of the redeemed in the Apocalypse, washed white in the blood of the Lamb. As the Church grew secure enough to be able to plan her liturgy, she began to use colour so that our sense of sight could deepen our experience of the mysteries of salvation, just as incense recruits our sense of smell and music that of hearing. Over the centuries various schemes of colour for feasts and seasons were worked out, and it is only as late as the 19th century that they were harmonized into their present form.
| Mid-morning reading (Terce) | (1 Corinthians 15:3-5) © |
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Christ died for our sins, in accordance with the scriptures; he was buried; and he was raised to life on the third day, in accordance with the scriptures. He appeared first to Cephas and secondly to the Twelve.
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| Noon reading (Sext) | Ephesians 2:4-6 © |
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God loved us with so much love that he was generous with his mercy: when we were dead through our sins, he brought us to life with Christ – it is through grace that you have been saved – and raised us up with him and gave us a place with him in heaven, in Christ Jesus.
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| Afternoon reading (None) | Romans 6:4 © |
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When we were baptised we went into the tomb with him and joined him in death, so that as Christ was raised from the dead by the Father’s glory, we too might live a new life.
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