St. Catherine Laboure

St. Catherine Laboure – November 28th

Zoe Laboure was the daughter of a French farmer, and she was the only one of her large family who did not go to school. She could not read or write at all. Her mother died while she was still very young, and Zoe had to run the house when her older sister became a nun.

Zoe, too, would have liked to enter the convent when she was in her early teens, but had to wait until she was twenty-four. She became a Sister of Charity of St. Vincent de Paul and took the name of Catherine.

Shortly after she finished her period of training as a postulant, Sister Catherine began to receive the special privilege of seeing the Blessed Mother. One night, she was awakened from sleep by a “shining child” who led her to the chapel. There Our Lady came to talk to her. The Blessed Mother, in another vision, showed herself standing on a globe with streams of light coming from her hands. Underneath were the words: “O Mary, conceived without sin, pray for us who turn to thee!” Sister Catherine was told that a medal was to be made of this picture of Our Lady and that all who wore it would receive many graces from God through His Mother’s prayers.

Sister Catherine told her confessor and he later told the bishop. So it was that the medal which we call the miraculous medal was made, and soon many, many people all over the world were wearing it. Yet no one in the convent knew that humble Sister Catherine was the one to whom Our Lady had appeared! She spent the remaining forty-five years of her life answering the door, looking after the hens that provided the nuns with eggs, and taking care of old and sick people. She was happy to keep her special privilege hidden, for she was only interested in serving God as best she could.

I will wear the Miraculous Medal and often repeat the ejaculation: “O Mary, conceived without sin, pray for us who turn to thee!”

St. Vincent de Paul

St. Vincent de Paul - Patron of Charitable Institutions - July 19th

Vincent was the son of poor French peasants. When he grew up and became famous, he loved to tell people how he had taken care of his father’s pigs. Because he showed himself to be very intelligent his father sent him to school. And after finishing his studies Vincent became a priest.

At first, he was given an important position as the teacher of rich children, and he lived rather comfortably. Then one day, he was called to the side of a dying peasant, and in front of many people, this man declared that all his past confessions had been bad ones, all sacrileges! Suddenly Vincent realized how badly the poor people of France needed spiritual help. When he began to preach to them, crowds went to confession, and he finally decided to found a congregation of priests to work especially among the poor.

The charities of St. Vincent de Paul were so many that it seems impossible for one man to have done so much. He took care of criminals who were made to labor in the sailing ships. He founded the Congregation of the Sisters of Charity with St. Louise de Marillac. He opened hospitals and homes of money for poor areas, sent missionaries to many countries, and bought back prisoners from the Mohammedans. So charitable a man, however, humbly admitted that he was not so by nature. “I would have been hard, rough and ill-tempered,” he said, “were it not for God’s grace.”

Am I selfish? Jesus asks me to be good to others, especially to those who suffer. He says to me, too, “Amen, I say to you, as long as you did it to one of these My least brethren, you did it to Me”.

Blessed Madeleine Fontaine and Her Three Companions

Blessed Madeleine Fontaine and Her Three Companions - June 27th

These four French martyrs were Sisters of Charity of St. Vincent de Paul. Besides Blessed Madeleine, there were Blessed Frances Lanel, Blessed Teresa Fantou, and Blessed Joan Gerard. They were put to death for their Faith in the bloodiest days of the French Revolution.

First, the four Sisters were arrested because they refused to take an oath that could not be taken without committing a sin. The enemies of the church said that they had found certain papers in the convent which showed that the Sisters had been working against the Revolution. None of this was true, but a wicked judge in the city of Cambrai had Blessed Madeleine, the Superior, condemned to death, together with her three Sisters.

The sisters walked to their execution calmly singing a hymn to the Blessed Mother, “Hail, Star of the Sea.” Sister Madeleine was the last to die. As she came near the guillotine, she cried to the watching crowd: “Listen, Christians! We are the last victims. The persecution is going to stop. The altars of Jesus will rise again in glory!”

Her prophecy came true. The evil man who had judged the martyrs had to stop the executions because people were so angry with him. Six weeks later, he himself was beheaded.

No matter what happens, we should never promise to do something which is forbidden by God’s law.