MIRACLES THROUGH THE INTERCESSION OF ST. ANTHONY

In Two Places At One Time!

IN the Church of St. Pierre-du-Queyraix in Limoges, an incident took place which more than ever showed the extraordinary favors granted by Heaven to St. Anthony of Padua. It was Easter and Anthony was preaching the sermon of the day. Suddenly he remembered that he had been appointed to chant the Aleluia at the Convent Mass in the local friary. And he had failed to arrange for a substitute.

Anthony stopped short in his sermon and remained silent for some time. To the congregation it appeared that the preacher was merely gathering his thoughts. What they did not know was that Anthony, during that period of silence, had appeared in the convent choir to fulfill his assignment. A few moments later Anthony took up the thread of his interrupted sermon as if nothing had occured. A miracle of bilocation had been worked in his behalf.

A Franciscan Vocation Saved!

THE Provincial Chapter of September 1226 appointed Anthony as Custos of the Province of Limoges. Shortly after taking over his new duties in the Order, it was brought to the attention of Anthony that one of the novices was thinking of leaving the community. God revealed the temptation of the young friar so that Anthony might help him in his hour of need.

The novice was called into the presence of his superior. Anthony first embraced the youth with all the tender affection of a father. Then he revealed all that had been troubling the young Franciscan. When he had finished, Anthony breathed on the novice and said, "Receive the Holy Spirit!" In a moment the troublesome temptation to return to the world had vanished completely. The novice Peter took his vows and presevered in the religious vocation that had been saved for him through the help of St. Anthony.

SAINT ANTHONY OF PADOVA

Anthony of Padua wasn't always a Franciscan. His early days in religion
were spent as a Canon Regular of St. Augustine. As guest master in the Abbey of Holy Cross outside Coimbra in Portugal, he met the first Franciscan missionaries who were passing through on their way to Morocco.

The enthusiasm with which the friars spoke of the possibility of martyrdom among the infidels was catching. Anthony, or Ferdinand, as he was then known, would have gone with the missionaries if he could have done so.

The Franciscan missionaries were martyred and their relics brought back to the Abbey of Holy Cross. Ferdinand spent a whole night in prayer before the precious relics of those first martyrs of the Order. In the morning his decision had been made. He too would be a Franciscan. With the consent of his superior Ferdinand the Canon Regular became Anthony the Franciscan.
Francis Blesses the Friars!

SAINT FRANCIS OF ASSISI died the evening of Oct. 3, 1226. But shortly before his death, Francis appeared in silent testimony of the work of his glorious son, Anthony of Padua. During the last days of September the friars had assembled at Arles for a Chapter. Anthony preached, taking as text, "Jesus of Nazareth, King of the Jews."

In the midst of Anthony's sermon, one of the friars noticed the presence of St. Francis in the room. The Seraphic Saint, suspended in air, stood with hands raised in blessing over the friars assembled there in solemn session. At that moment all present were filled with a great peace, so that they wondered what had happened.
When the friar told of the vision he had seen, they knew that Francis had come to bless especially the work of Anthony, their conferere. He would truly be the Ark of the Testament and the Hammer of Heretics.

Men Won't Listen, Fishes Will!

EVEN though he was an eloquent preacher, St. Anthony wasn't always able to get an audience. Such was the case one day in Fimini. Undaunted by the refusal of the heretics of Rimini to listen to the word of God, the Saint was determined to preach to those who would listen. So he walked to the seashore and took his stand at the water's edge. As the saintly friar began to preach, the surface of the water was broken by the heads of countless fishes which rose to listen.

St. Anthony preached to the fishes of the glory of God and the goodness of their Creator. He bade them be grateful and thus confound the coldness of the people of Rimini who had no place for the word of God in their hearts. Not a fish moved as St. Anthony went on with his sermon to his quite unusual congregation. When he had finished, the Saint blessed the fish with the Sign of the Cross. Then they left.

WHO IS THE HOLY SPIRIT ?

When we speak about the ‘Holy Spirit’, we can never separate Him from the Father and the Son. God took upon himself the nature of man, in the person of Jesus Christ, to obey, to accomplish the Divine Plan of God the Father. So there exists a bond of love between the Father and the Son, that bond, that love is the ‘Spirit’.

The Holy Spirit renews the face of the earth, makes all things new, gives life, a new life. And what better example can be presented if not of a married couple. The fruit, the result of the consumed love between the married man and woman is ‘a new life’. The baby, the new creature, is the proof of that love of the couple.

But when we think about the Holy Spirit, we can’t imagine any facial characteristics, or looks … not even a name. It is no coincidence that in various languages He is referred to almost by the same ‘thought’, by the same ‘characteristic’. In Hebrew He is called ‘ruah’, very similar to the Maltese words ‘rih’ (wind) and ‘ruh’ (soul). In Greek He is called ‘pneuma’, which means air, from which we get the English word ‘pneumatic’.

In Latin we address Him as ‘spiritus’ meaning ‘spirit’, in English as well, He is addressed as ‘spirit’ or ‘ghost’, in Italian we use ‘spirito’. In Costantinople we find the magnificent Cathedral of ‘Santa Sofia’, (the Holy Spirit), we have ‘sofia’ meaning ‘breath’. So as we can notice these are words taken from the elements, from nature; air wind spirit, breath.

Though we can’t listen or hear His voice, nor touch Him yet, we can feel his presence, his promptinhgs, as St.John tells us: “The Spirit blows where it wills. We do not know from where He comes or where He is blowing.” (3:8). YET, His presence can be felt. The Spirit always acts through another ‘person’, when the Spirit takes hold of, overwhelms, we could say transforms someone, that particular person changes completely, radically, he will be a new person, a new life, a new birth.

Just look at our dear apostle Simon, son of Jonah, the rough, hyper fisherman, always ready to challenge everyone, can’t hold his tongue in place, a bully, I might say, even a liar because he lacked courage to face the truth. Yet, look at the ‘transformation’ that overwhelmed this same Galilean, when he was filled, taken over by the Holy Spirit. We read in the Acts that he baptized 3,000 at one go. NOW, Simon bar Jonah has been born again, changed into Peter the Rock, to the point of suffering martyrdom.

The power, the influence of the Holy Spirit is … only one word can be chosen … ‘extraordinary’, things of great wonder will be performed. As the Psalm goes: “He will renew the face of the earth” (104:30) But His power, His influence is always ‘internal influence’. As St.John tells us: “But you shall know Him because He abides with you and in you.”

The Holy Spirit alone leads us to discover the ‘truth’, it is the Holy Spirit who helps us to pray, to see, to understand everything in a different light, in its proper perspective, as God wills it. We have to open up to the Spirit who is already in us. Few realise that we have received the Holy Spirit on the day of our Baptism, when our parents wisely decided on our behalf. When we receive the Sacrament of Confirmation, we would actually be personally confirming, declaring that we accept the power of the Holy Spirit to work in us.

A Catholic, worthy of the name, should not wait for the Feast of Pentecost to invoke the Holy Spirit. We can have all the help we need in all type of situations in our daily life. HE is there, certainly not asleep. Maybe, very often, we are the ones who are asleep and do not realise the power that is within us. Do invite Him to come to your aid, not once a day, but in every moment of ‘decision’… and we do take thousands of decisions every day. But, do consult the Paraclete before taking any decision in life and you will be amazed how things turn out the way God wills them … much better than we were planning.

“Holy Spirit, enlighten us to see the true Light, lead us to find the one Way, and help us enter through the right Door of our Father’s Mansion prepared for us since eternity. Amen.”

THE ESSENCE OF HUMILITY       2.

“Christ, bring a Divine Person, did not regard His glory as a thing to be clung to during His mortal life. He took the nature of  a slave, a servant to be a mere man.  In humble obedience He undertook a task which led to His death on the cross … in all humility.” (J.P.Arendzen, D.D., Ph.D. M.A. O.P.)

The acknowledgement of the divine almightiness, on the one hand, and of one's imperfection, on the other, are the basis of the attitude which is called humility.
When man, led by a deep faith, encounters the Creator's infinite power, he cannot help perceiving his smallness and weakness, his insignificance, seeing himself as a tiny insect on the shore of a boundless ocean. This is why in the presence of God humility is but the most natural feeling. Vanity and pride can only exist in the one who, being removed far from God, is comparing himself to other minute creatures like himself.

Sound faith, according to the word of the Saviour, is capable of  “moving mountains”  (Matthew 17:20) — not due to some kind of supernatural power that comes along with such faith, as certain sectarians will teach, but because it is capable of attracting the divine power — and the latter can do the impossible.

For this reason all known examples of a firm and wonder-working faith are, at the same time, examples of a profound humility: the woman suffering from hemorrhage (Mark 5:25-28), the mother from Canaan (Matthew 15:22-28), and many others. The stronger one's faith is, the more he is humble; and vice versa, a proud person cannot possess a profound faith, being all absorbed in one's self. Being spiritually weak, he is therefore unquiet and easily scared, although he might do his best in order to conceal it.

Spiritual and lay literature alike have known many examples of great and gifted personalities. Many gifted people realized that they were only too far from the measure of perfection or knowledge that they were capable of achieving. Knowing this did not, to the least extent, make them feeble or low-spirited. On the contrary, it gave them more incentive to pursue excellence.

To think that humility kills one's initiative, giving him an inert and servile disposition, is to miss the essence of Christianity. The latter's decisive trait is that it calls the man to perfection by way of ascension from the present state, which is damaged by sin, to a likeness of God, as is said: "Be ye therefore perfect, even as your Father which is in heaven is perfect" (Matthew 5:48). The self-sufficient proud man is in fact the most wretched one, because he is so blind he cannot even perceive his misery (Revelation 3:17).

THE ESSENCE OF HUMILITY       1.

The Holy Scripture teaches that humility is the essential virtue, without which it is impossible to bear any good fruit at all. Our Lord Jesus Christ began His Sermon on the Mount with a call to humility, saying: "Blessed are the poor in spirit, for theirs is the kingdom of heaven" (Matthew 5:3). As the common poor realize they are in need of everything, so does the one poor in spirit see himself as imperfect and in need of divine assistance. Being conscious of this, in turn, attracts God's mercy, which makes him abundantly rich.

Unfortunately, most "worldly" people underestimate and even despise the virtue of humility. They tend to think that while preaching humility, Christianity is degrading the human person and obliterating one's natural feeling of dignity. Humility, they say, deprives one of an active attitude in life, extinguishes all initiative and nurtures a servile mindset. Such an erroneous notion of humility is only rooted in a lack of spiritual knowledge.

The essence of humility is best illustrated in the Gospel. Let's take the example of the healing of the Roman centurion's servant. In one of His visits to Capernaum, Jesus Christ was approached by a Roman centurion (an officer in modern terms), who had the following request: "Lord, my servant lieth at home sick of the palsy, grievously tormented," to which the Saviour, Who never declined anyone's wish, promised that He would visit his home and heal the servant.

Every believing person would have rejoiced at such a promise. But the centurion's reaction was far from average: "Lord, I am not worthy that Thou shouldest come under my roof: but speak the word only, and my servant shall be healed." The centurion's profound faith and humility moved the Lord to such an extent that not only did He immediately heal his servant, but also made him an example for others, saying: "I have not found so great faith, no, not in Israel" (Matthew 8:6-13).

Having heard of the numerous healings that the Saviour had performed, the centurion acquired an intense faith in His almightiness. Without denigrating his dignity in any way, he realized, at the same time, that he was unworthy to demand any kind of special attention toward his person, all the more so being a pagan and a foreigner. He also remembered that if he, being a common man, is unquestionably obeyed by his minors, so much the more everything will obey the will of the One sent by God.

SPIRITUAL GUIDANCE

“Our Lord is hidden there, waiting for us to come and visit him and ask him or what we want. He is there, in the Sacrament of his love, sighing and interceding unceasingly for sinners before God his Father. He is thereto console us … See how good he is! He adapts himself to our weakness…

In heaven where we shall be triumphant and glorious, we shall see him in all his glory; if he had appeared before us now in glory, we should not have dared to approach him; but he hides himself like one in prison, saying to us, ‘You do not see me, but that does not matter; ask me for all you want, and I will grant it you.’”

“All the good works in the world are not equal to the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass because they are the works of men; but the Mass is the work of God. Martyrdom is nothing in comparison for it is but the sacrifice of man to God; but the Mass is the sacrifice of God for man.”

“If we could comprehend all the good things contained in Holy Communion, nothing more would be wanting to content the heart of man. The miser would run no more after his treasures, or the ambitious after glory; each would shake off the dust of the earth, leave the world, and fly away towards heaven.”

From the Writings of St.John Mary Vianney