Friends at Court.

New Zealand Tablet, Volume XXVII, Issue 17, 27 April 1899, Page 7

Friends at Court.

BIOGRAPHICAL GLEANINGS FOR NEXT WEEK'S CALENDAR. (Written for the N.Z. Tablet.) Apbil 30, Sunday.— Fourth Sunday after Easter. St. Catherine of Siena, O.S.D. Mat 1, Monday.— SS. Philip and James, Apotles, „ 2, Tuesday.— St. Athanasius, Bishop, Confessor and Doctor. „ 3, Wednesday.— Finding of the Holy Crow. „ 4, Thursday.— fit. Monica, Widow. „ 5, Friday.— St. Pius V., Pope and Confessor. „ 6, Saturday. — St. John before the Latin Gate. BS. PHILIP AJTD JAMBS, APOSTLBA. Philip was on© of the first ohosen disciples of Christ On the way from Judea to Galilee our Lord found Philip and said, ' Follow Me. 1 Philip straightway obeyed ; and then in his zeal and charity sought to win Nathaniel also, saying, ' We have found Him of whom Moses and the prophets did write, Jesus of Nazareth ; ' and when Nathaniel in wonder asked, ' Can any good oome out of Nazareth V Philip simply answered, • Come and see, 1 and brought him to Jesus. Anotbar characteristic saying of this Apostle is preserved for us by St. John. Christ in His last discourse had spoken of His Father ■ and Philip exclaimed in the fervour of his thirst for God, ' Lord' show us the Father, and it is enough.' St. James the Less, the author of an inspired Epistle, was also one of the Twelve. St. Paul tells us that he was favoured by a special apparition of Christ after the Resurrection. On the dispersion of the Apostles among the nations, St. Jameß was left as Bishop of Jerusalem ; and even the Jews held in such high veneration hiß purity, mortification, and prayer, that they named him the Just. He sat beside St. Peter and St. Paul at the Council of Jerusalem ; and when St. Paul at a later time escaped the fury of the Jews by appealing to Caesar, the people took vengeance on Jamee, and crying, 1 The just one hath erred,' they stoned him to death. The Church commemorates on the same day SS. Philip and James, whose bodies lie side by side at Rome. They represent to us two aspects of Christian holiness. The first preashes faith, the second works ; the one holy aspirations, the other purity of heart. The earliest of Church historians has handed down many traditions of St. James's sanctity. He was always a virgin, says Hegesippus, and consecrated to God. He drank no wine, wore no sandals on his feet, and but a single garment on his body. He prostrated himself bo much in prayer that the skin of his knees was hardened like a camel's hoof. The Jews, it is said, used, ou.t of respect, to touch tbe hem of his garment. He was indeed a living proof of his own words : ' The wisdom that is from above first indeed is chaste, then peaceable, modest, full of mercy and good fruits. ST. ATHANASIUS, BISHOP. Athanasiua was born in Egypt towards the end of the third •entury, and was from his youth pious. He was learned and deeply versed in the sacred Scriptures, as befitted one whom God had chosen to be the champion and defender of His Church against the Arian heresy. Though only a deacon, he was chosen by his bishop to go with him to the Council of Nicoea, A.D. 325, and attracted the attention of all by the learning and ability with which he defended the faith. A few months later he became Patriarch of Alexandria, and for forty-six years he bore, often well nigh alone, the whole brunt of the Arian assault. He stood unmoved against four Roman emperors ; was banished five times ; was the butt of every insult, calumny, and wrong the Arians could devise ; and lived in constant peril of death. Though firm as adamant in defence of the Faith, he was meek and humble, pleasant and winning in converse, beloved by his flock, unwearied in labours, in prayer, in mortification, and in zeal for souls. In the year 373 his stormy life closed in peace, rather that his people would have it so than that his enemies were weary of persecuting him. He left to the Church the whole and ancient faith, defended and explained in writings rich in thought and learning, clear, keen, and stately in expression. He is honoured as one of the greatest of the Doctors of the Church. God has promised, said St. Athanasius, to be a wall of fire round about those who rightly believe in Him. On the refusal of the saint to restore Arius to Catholio communion, the Emperor ordered the Patriarch of Constantinople to do bo. The wretched heresiarch took an oath w that he had always believed as the Church believes, and the patriarch, after vainly using every effort to move the Emperor, had recourse to fasting and prayer, that God would avert from the Church the frightful sacrilege. The day came for the solemn entrance of Arius into the great church of Santa Sophia. The heresiarch and his party set out glad and in triumph. But before he reached the church death smote him swiftly and awfully, and the dreaded sacrilege was averted. ' Contend earnestly for the faith once delivered to the saints.'— Jude 3.