What is This Saint of the Year Devotion All About?


This isn't superstition. St. Faustina and her religious order did the same thing!

I would like to explain to you about the practice of picking a saint at random to be your “holy protector and intercessor” for the year. Actually, the saint is the one who chooses us though.The tradition of letting a saint “pick you,”is not a new one. St. Faustina wrote about it in her diary, "Divine Mercy in My Soul".
The excerpt is below. . .

“There is a custom among us of drawing by lot, on New Year's Day, special Patrons for ourselves for the whole year. In the morning, during meditation, there arose within me a secret desire that the Eucharistic Jesus be my special Patron for this year also, as in the past. But, hiding this desire from my Beloved, I spoke to Him about everything else but that. When we came to refectory for breakfast, we blessed ourselves and began drawing our patrons. When I approached the holy cards on which the names of the patrons were written, without hesitation I took one, but I didn't read the name immediately as I wanted to mortify myself for a few minutes. Suddenly, I heard a voice in my soul: ‘I am your patron. Read.’ I looked at once at the inscription and read, ‘Patron for the Year 1935 - the Most Blessed Eucharist.’ My heart leapt with joy, and I slipped quietly away from the sisters and went for a short visit before the Blessed Sacrament,where I poured out my heart. But Jesus sweetly admonished me that I should be at that moment together with the sisters. I went immediately in obedience to the rule.”

Excerpt from "Divine Mercy in My Soul, the Diary of St. Faustina"

Friday, February 22, 2013








Fra Angelico's The Virgin of Humility





In Paradise there are many saints who never gave alms on earth:
their poverty justified them. There are many saints who never mortified their
bodies by fasting or wearing hair-shirts: their bodily infirmities excused
them. There are many saints, too, who were not virgins:
their vocation was otherwise.

 


 
But in Paradise there is no saint who was not humble.
God banished angels

from heaven for their pride; therefore how can we pretend to enter therein if we do not keep ourselves in a state of humility?
To be humble is to be truthful before God, for what is humility but a
recognition of ourselves as totally dependent on Him?

 

Saint Vincent de Paul said:


"The reason God is such a great lover of humility is that He is a great lover of truth. Humility is, in fact, truth, while pride is nothing but lying."
from Humility of Heart by Father Cajetan

 

Learn from me for I am meek and humble of heart (Matt 11:29)
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