Oswald was of a noble Saxon family and was endowed with a very rare and beautiful form of body with a singular piety of soul. He was brought up by his uncle, St Odo, Archbishop of Canterbury, and was chosen, while still young, dean of the secular canons of Westminster, then very relaxed.
His attempt to reform them was a failure; and he saw, with that infallible instinct which so often guides the Saints in critical times, that the true remedy for the corruptions of the clergy was the restoration of the monastic life.
He therefore went to France and took the habit of St Benedict, but returned, only to receive the news of Odo’s death. He found, however, a new patron in St Dunstan, now metropolitan, through whose influence he was nominated to the see of Worcester.
To these two saints, together with Ethelwold of Winchester, the monastic revival of the tenth century is mainly due. Oswald’s first care was to deprive of their benefices the disorderly clerics, whom he replaced as far as possible by regulars, and himself founded seven religious houses.
Considering that in the hearts of the secular canons there were yet some sparks of virtue, he would not at once expel them, but rather entrapped them by a holy artifice.
Adjoining the cathedral he built a church in honor of the Mother of God, causing it to be served by a body of strict religious. He himself assisted at the divine Office in this church, and his example was followed by the people.
The canons, finding themselves isolated and the cathedral deserted, chose rather to embrace the religious life than to continue not only to injure their own souls, but to be a mockery to their people by reason of the contrast offered by their worldliness to the regularity of their religious brethren.
As Archbishop of York a like success attended St Oswald’s efforts; and God manifested His approval of his zeal by discovering to him the relics of his great predecessor, St Wilfrid, which he reverently translated to Worcester.
• Reflection -- A soul without discipline is like a ship without a helm; she must inevitably strike unawares upon the rocks, founder on the shoals, or float unknowingly into the harbor of the enemy.
Ref: LIVES OF THE SAINTS. By Rev Alban Butler, pp90-91. Benziger Brothers, New York; www.archive.org/stream/pictoriallives...
Religion or Relationship
The 19th-century Danish theologian Sören Kierkegaard identified two kinds of religion -- Religion A and Religion B. The first is “faith” in name only (2 Tim 3:5). It’s the practice of attending church without genuine faith in the living Lord.
Religion B, on the other hand, is a life-transforming, destiny-changing experience. It is a definite commitment to the crucified and risen Savior, which establishes an ongoing personal relationship between a forgiven sinner and a gracious God.
This difference explains why for many years British author C.S. Lewis had such difficulty in becoming a Christian. Religion A had blinded him to Religion B. According to his brother Warren, his conversion was “no sudden plunge into a new life, but rather a slow, steady convalescence from a deep-seated spiritual illness -- an illness that had its origins in our childhood, in the dry husks of religion offered by the semi-political churchgoing of Ulster, and the similar dull emptiness of compulsory church during our school days.”
We all face two pivotal questions:
First, are we bogged down in the empty ceremonialism of Religion A? If so, we must receive Jesus as our Savior.
Second, is our relationship with Christ growing more deep and vital? -- VCG
Ref: OUR DAILY BREAD, January-December. For Personal and Family Devotions, Vol 6, Copyright © 1999 RBC Ministries
Human Aspiration
The terrible human aspiration that reaches out over the abyss is calmed. The terror of God is so far beyond all conceivable terror that it ceases to terrify, and then suddenly becomes friendly.
At last, begins the utterly unbelievable consolation, the consolation into which we enter through the door of apparent despair: the deep conviction, as impossible to explain as it is to resist, that in the depths of our uselessness and futility we are done with God.
“He who is joined to the Lord is one spirit.” We have found him in the abyss of our own poverety -- not in a horrible night, not in a tragic immolation, but simply in the ordinary, uninteresting actuality of our own everyday life. (Thomas Merton, Seasons of Celebration)
The Truest Solitude
The truest solitude is not something outside you, not an absence of men or of sound around you: it is an abyss opening up in the center of your own soul. And this abyss of interior solitude is a hunger that will never be satisfied with any created thing.
The only way to find solitude is by hunger and thirst and sorrow and poverty and desire. The man who has found solitude is empty, as if he had been emptied by death. (Thomas Merton, New Seeds of Contemplation)
Ref: Throughout the Year with Thomas Merton. Daily Meditations from His Writings. Selected and Edited by Thomas P. McDonnell p36. Image Books edition published October 1985 by special arrangement with Doubleday & Company, Inc. Printed in the United States of America.
Vestments
The priest’s vestments for Mass which must be blessed before they may be used are:
The alb is a white and wide linen robe reaching from the shoulders to the feet and covering the entire body. Symbolically, it reminds us of the white garment with which Herod clothed our Lord. It also signifies purity of conscience demanded from God’s priest.
The stole is a strip of silken material about eighty inches long. It is worn round the neck and across the breast downwards. It represents the cords with which Jesus was tied and the cross that was laid on his shoulders. It is the yoke which Christ said we must takeup, the priest’s burden of heavy responsibility. Our Lord promised to make it sweet. The priest wears it at most official functions.
The chasuble is the outer garment of the celebrant. Originally, it was a cloak completely covering the priest. It is an emblem of the purple cloak worn by our Lord before Pilate, an emblem of love which must encircle us completely.
Ref: “Happiness is ... J.O.S.E.P.H.” 365 days reflection based on Pope John Paul II’s CATECHISM OF THE CATHOLIC CHURCH. Rev Fr Jose M Dimaculangan, St Joseph Family Apostolate, p74. NIHIL OBSTAT: Msgr Benedicto S Aquino, P.C. V ice Chancellor, Ardhdiocese of Manila. IMPRIMATUR: Msgr Josefino S Ramirez, P.C. Vicar General and Chancellor, Archdiocese of Manila. February 10, 1995
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