Topics: Feast Day: St. Anthony...Video: Discovering our Saints...St. Anthony of Padua Parish Wichita: Golden Relic Case...Video: St. Anthony of Padua
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+I wonder who's Feast day it is? Well, would you look who we have here? St. Anthony of course!
Once while helping change out the St. Anthony statue above the high altar with the risen Christ statue Bob Wells warned to watch out for "St. Tony". Wondering what he meant by that we continued our work shuffling the statue to the back of the pedestal when sure enough...I banged my head on the statue's right arm. Yes it hurt. Bob said St. Tony smacked me for my sins.
+I discovered that I always eat a hot dog with the open side to the right. Tomorrow I will tell you how a hot dog saved my spiritual life.
+ Can anyone tell me if any Latin was used at the 125the Anniversary mass? I was unable to attend.
+By the way...many of you tell me you receive these postings by email. IF you are not a subscriber and are being forwarded these emails you may be missing pictures, video, links and other info! You can always visit http://venite-missa-est.blogspot.com/.
To post a comment, ask a question, or submit an article contact me, Mark, at bumpy187@gmail.com.
..and now for the necessaries.
Please note: St. Anthony Catholic Church is one of only two churches celebrating the Traditional Latin Mass (EFLR) in the Wichita area. Though this blog is loosely centered around this parish and it's members, Venite Missa Est! is by no means, in any way an official voice of, or for, St. Anthony Parish or the Diocese of Wichita. Venite Missa Est! is strictly a private layman's endeavor.
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St. Anthony of Padua
Doctor of the Church
Feastday: June 13
1195 - 1231
Saint Anthony was canonized (declared a saint) less than one year after his death.
There is perhaps no more loved and admired saint in the Catholic Church than Saint Anthony of Padua, a Doctor of the Church. Though his work was in Italy, he was born in Portugal. He first joined the Augustinian Order and then left it and joined the Franciscan Order in 1221, when he was 26 years old. The reason he became a Franciscan was because of the death of the five Franciscan protomartyrs -- St. Bernard, St. Peter, St. Otho, St. Accursius, and St. Adjutus -- who shed their blood for the Catholic Faith in the year 1220, in Morocco, in North Africa, and whose headless and mutilated bodies had been brought to St. Anthony’s monastery on their way back for burial. St. Anthony became a Franciscan in the hope of shedding his own blood and becoming a martyr. He lived only ten years after joining the Franciscan Order.
So simple and resounding was his teaching of the Catholic Faith, so that the most unlettered and innocent might understand it, that he was made a Doctor of the Church by Pope Pius XII in 1946. Saint Anthony was only 36 years old when he died. He is called the “hammer of the Heretics” His great protection against their lies and deceits in the matter of Christian doctrine was to utter, simply and innocently, the Holy Name of Mary. When St. Anthony of Padua found he was preaching the true Gospel of the Catholic Church to heretics who would not listen to him, he then went out and preached it to the fishes. This was not, as liberals and naturalists are trying to say, for the instruction of the fishes, but rather for the glory of God, the delight of the angels, and the easing of his own heart. St. Anthony wanted to profess the Catholic Faith with his mind and his heart, at every moment.
He is typically depicted with a book and the Infant Child Jesus, to whom He miraculously appeared, and is commonly referred to today as the "finder of lost articles." Upon exhumation, some 336 years after his death, his body was found to be corrupted, yet his tongue was totally incorrupt, so perfect were the teachings that had been formed upon it.
Early life
Fernando Martins de Bulhões was born in Lisbon to Vicente Martins de Bulhões and Teresa Pais Taveira. His father was the brother of Pedro Martins de Bulhões, the ancestor of the Bulhão or Bulhões family. His was a very rich family of the nobility who wanted him to become educated, and they arranged for him to be instructed at the local cathedral school. Against the wishes of his family, however, he entered the community of Canons Regular at the Abbey of St. Vincent on the outskirts of Lisbon. The Canons were famous for their dedication to scholarly pursuits, and sent the youth to their major center of studies, the Abbey of the Holy Cross in Coimbra. There the young Fernando studied theology and Latin.
Joining the Franciscans
After his ordination to the priesthood, Fernando was named guestmaster and placed in charge of hospitality for the abbey. It was in this capacity, in 1219, that he came into contact with five Franciscan friars who were on their way to Morocco to preach the Gospel to the Muslims there. Fernando was strongly attracted to the simple, evangelical lifestyle of the friars, whose order had been founded only eleven years prior. In February of the following year, news arrived that the five Franciscans had been martyred in Morocco, the first to be killed in their new order. Seeing their bodies as they were processed back to Assisi, Fernando meditated on the heroism of these men; inspired by their example, and longing for the same gift of martyrdom, he obtained permission from church authorities to leave the Augustinian Canons to join the new Franciscan Order. Upon his admission to the life of the friars, he joined the small hermitage in Olivais, adopting the name Anthony (from the name of the chapel located there, dedicated to Saint Anthony the Great), by which he was to be known.[2]
The new Brother Anthony then set out for Morocco, in fulfillment of his new vocation. Illness, however, stopped him on his journey. At this point, he decided to head to Italy, the center of his new order.
On the voyage there, his ship was driven by a storm onto the coast of Sicily and he landed at Messina. From Sicily he made his way to Tuscany where he was assigned to a convent of the order, but he met with difficulty on account of his sickly appearance. He was finally assigned, out of pure compassion, to the rural hospice of San Paolo near Forlì, Romagna, a choice made after considering his poor health. There he appears to have lived as a hermit and was put to work in the kitchen, while being allowed to spend much time in private prayer and study.[3]
Preaching and teaching
One day, on the occasion of an ordination, a great many visiting Dominican friars were present, and there was some misunderstanding over who should preach. The Franciscans naturally expected that one of the Dominicans would occupy the pulpit, for they were renowned for their preaching; the Dominicans, on the other hand, had come unprepared, thinking that a Franciscan would be the homilist. In this quandary, the head of the hermitage, who had no one among his own humble friars suitable for the occasion, called upon Anthony, whom he suspected was most qualified, and entreated him to speak whatever the Holy Spirit should put into his mouth. Anthony objected but was overruled, and his sermon created a deep impression. Not only his rich voice and arresting manner, but the entire theme and substance of his discourse and his moving eloquence, held the attention of his hearers.
At that point, Anthony was commissioned by Brother Gratian, the local Minister Provincial, to preach the Gospel throughout the area of Lombardy, in northern Italy. In this capacity he came to the attention of the founder of the order, Francis of Assisi. Francis had held a strong distrust of the place of theological studies in the life of his brotherhood, fearing that it might lead to an abandonment of their commitment to a life of real poverty. In Anthony, however, he found a kindred spirit for his vision, who was also able to provide the teaching needed by young members of the order who might seek ordination. He thereby entrusted the pursuit of studies for any of his friars to the care of Brother Anthony. From then on his skills were used to the utmost by the Church. Occasionally he took another post, as a teacher, for instance, at the universities of Montpellier and Toulouse in southern France, but it was as a preacher that Anthony revealed his supreme gift.
In 1226, after attending the General Chapter of his order held at Arles, France, and preaching in the French region of Provence, Anthony returned to Italy and served as envoy from the general chapter to Pope Gregory IX. At the Papal court, his preaching was hailed as a "jewel case of the Bible" and he was commissioned to produce his collection of sermons, Sermons for Feast Days (Sermones in Festivitates).
Anthony became ill with edema and, in 1231, went to the woodland retreat at Camposampiero with two other friars for a respite. There Anthony lived in a cell built for him under the branches of a walnut tree. Anthony died on the way back to Padua on 13 June 1231 at the Poor Clare monastery at Arcella, aged 36.
Various legends surround the death of Anthony. One holds that when he died, the children cried in the streets and that all the bells of the churches rang of their own accord. Another legend regards his tongue. Anthony is buried in a chapel within the large basilica built to honor him, where his tongue is displayed for veneration in a large reliquary. For, when his body was exhumed thirty years after his death, it was claimed that the tongue glistened and looked as if it was still alive and moist; apparently a further claim was made that this was a sign of his gift of preaching.[4]
Veneration
Saint Anthony of Padua Holding Baby Jesus, Bernardo Strozzi, oil on canvas, circa 1625, Musée des Beaux-Arts de Strasbourg
Anthony could be said to have become one of the "quickest" saints in the history of the Catholic Church because he was canonized by Pope Gregory IX on 30 May 1232, at Spoleto, Italy, less than one year after his death.[5] His fame spread through Portuguese evangelization, and he has been known as the most celebrated of the followers of Saint Francis of Assisi. He is the patron saint of his adopted home of Padua, as well as of his native Lisbon, not to mention many other places in Portugal and in the countries of the former Portuguese Empire. He is especially invoked for the recovery of lost items.[6]
Proclaimed a Doctor of the Church by Pope Pius XII on 16 January 1946, he is sometimes called the "Evangelical Doctor" (Doctor Evangelicus).
Cultural traditions
St Anthony is venerated all over the world as the Patron Saint for lost articles, and is credited with many miracles involving lost people, lost things and even lost spiritual goods.
North America
Each year on the weekend of the last Sunday in August, Boston's North End holds a feast in honor of Saint Anthony. Referred to as the "Feast of All Feasts", Saint Anthony's Feast in Boston's North End was begun in 1919 by Italian immigrants from Montefalcione, a small town near Naples, where the tradition of honoring Saint Anthony goes back to 1688. The feast has become the largest Italian religious festival in the United States.
On 27 January 1907, in Beaumont, Texas, a church was dedicated and named in honor of Saint Anthony. The church was later designated a cathedral in 1966 with the formation of the Roman Catholic Diocese of Beaumont, but was not formally consecrated. On 28 April 1974, St. Anthony Cathedral was dedicated and consecrated by Bishop Warren Boudreaux. In 2006 Pope Benedict XVI granted the cathedral the designation of minor basilica. St. Anthony Cathedral Basilica celebrated its 100th anniversary on 28 January 2007.
Seventeenth-century Spanish missionaries came across a small Native American community along what was then known as the Yanaguana River on the feast day of Saint Anthony. They renamed the river in his honor, and eventually a mission built nearby as well. This mission became the focal point of a small community that eventually grew in size and scope to become the city of San Antonio in the U.S. state of Texas.
In Ellicott City, Maryland the Conventual Franciscans of the St. Anthony Province dedicated their old novitiate house as The Shrine of St. Anthony which since 1 July 2004 serves as the official Shrine to Saint Anthony for the Archdiocese of Baltimore, the nation's premier see. A large relic of Saint Anthony was gifted to the Shrine in 1995 by the friars in Padua as well as copies of 13 original paintings detailing particularly important moments in the life of St. Anthony. The Shrine of Saint Anthony is modeled upon the "Sacro Convento" in Assisi, Italy and situated upon land once owned by Charles Carroll III, the only Catholic signer of the Declaration of Independence. In addition to daily Mass and regular confession schedule, the Shrine of St. Anthony also offers retreat spaces for outside guests and hosts an annual pilgrimage in mid-June in honor of the Feast Day of St. Anthony of Padua.
Europe
Saint Anthony is known in Portugal, Spain, and Brazil as a marriage saint, because there are legends of him reconciling couples. His feast day, 13 June, is Lisbon's municipal holiday, celebrated with parades and marriages. (The previous day, 12 June, is the Brazilian Valentine's Day.) He is one of the saints celebrated in the Brazilian Festa Junina (also known as the "São João"), along with John the Baptist and Saint Peter.
Asia
In Uvari, in Tamil Nadu, India, the church of St. Anthony is home to an ancient wooden statue that is said to have cured the entire crew of a Portuguese ship suffering from cholera. Saint Anthony is said to perform many miracles daily, and Uvari is visited by pilgrims of different religions from all over South India. Tamil Nadu Christians have great reverence for Saint Anthony and he is a popular saint there, where he is called "The Miracle Saint". Devotion to Saint Anthony is popular throughout all of India. In Sri Lanka St Anthony is highly venerated. St Anthony National Shrine in Kochikade, Colombo receives many devotees of St Anthony, both Catholic & non-Catholic.
St. Anthony in Art
As the number of Franciscan saints increased the iconography struggled to distinguish Anthony from the others. Because of a legend that he had once preached to the fish, these were sometimes used as his attribute (example). He is also often seen with a lily stalk (see above). Other conventions referred to St. Anthony's visionary fervor. Thus, one attribute in use for some time was a flaming heart (example). In 1511, Titian painted three scenes of Miracles from the life of Saint Anthony: The Miracle of the Jealous Husband, which depicts the murder of a young woman by her husband; A Child Testifying to Its Mother's Innocence; and The Saint Healing the Young Man with a Broken Limb.[7]
Another key pattern has him meditating on an open book in which the Christ Child himself appears, as in the El Greco below. Over time the child came to be shown considerably larger than the book, and some images even do without the book entirely.
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The Golden Relic Case
St. Anthony Blessing after the St. Anthony Novena
A few years back I emailed Camilla Hartman, St. Anthony Parish Historian, about some questions I had about the church and it's history. She mantioned the little golden relic case which holds a St. Anthony relic. Here are her words from that email. This blessing is held at 12:05 mass on Tuesdays and is very moving.
The "golden relic case" is a little, handheld case which Fr. Pham uses on Tuesdays and places on a person's forehead when giving the St. Anthony blessing after the St. Anthony novena. I assume you probably work and cannot attend the 12:05 Tuesday Mass and Novena/Blessing; but if you ever have the chance, it is a short albeit moving service. St. Anthony and his intercessions are so real at those times.
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St. Anthony of Padua Video
