Friends at Court

New Zealand Tablet, 2 October 1919, Page 3

Friends at Court

GLEANINGS FOR NEXT WEEK'S CALENDAR. October Sunday. Seventeenth Sunday after Pentecost. ~ 6, Monday.—St. .Bruno, Confessor. „ 7,' Tuesday. of the Holy Rosary. . ~ 8, Wednesday.—St. Brigid, Widow. „ 9, Thursday.—SS. Denis and Companions, Martyrs. „ 10, Friday.—St. Francis Borgia, Confessor. « „ 11, Saturday.— of the Blessed Virgin Mary. Feast of the Holy Rosary. On the first Sunday of October, 1571, was fought the great battle of Lepanto, which saved Europe from the Turks, and gave the death-blow to the Ottoman power. In memory of this victory, gained at the very moment when the faithful were reciting the Rosary for the success of the Christian arms, Gregory XIII. ordered the present feast to be celebrated. St. Brigid, Widow. St. Brigid belonged to the Royal Family of Sweden. From childhood she was remarkable for charity, love of retirement, and a distate for worldly enjoyments. On the death of her husband she divided her property amongst her children and withdrew into a convent which she herself had founded. She died in Rome in 1373, at the age of 71, on her return from a pilgrimage to the Holy Land. SS. Denis ami Companions, Martyrs. St. Denis, the first Bishop of Paris, and one of the most illustrious writers of the early Church, is believed to have been identical with Denis the Areopagite, converted by St. Paul. He was martyred, with several companions, on the hill of Montmartre, in Paris, about the year lift. • GRAINS OF GOLD TO THE BLESSED VIRGIN. Hail, Mary! Mother of our God and King! Clothed with the Sun, tho Moon beneath thy feet —■ O, beauteous feet that o'er the mountains best of tidings bring, Holy," and true, and sweet! O, Virgin full of Grace! O, Queen of Mercy! Pray for us that we In heaven may see thy face! Jesus is with thee. lie, the One True Vine, Whose trellis was the Cross, whose wine the Blood That cheers His virgins with the ruby glow of love benign! O, by that Holy Rood ! Pray for us all to Him, The sceptre of whose pity thou dost hold Abovo the seraphim. -—B. I. Durward, in tho Missionary. MARY OF EGYPT. She strove to pass the church's door, but fell Struck by an unseen hand, that smote as well The senseless torpor of her outcast soul; With desolation and a keen distress, A pain. that pierced her inmost consciousness, Yet she had only followed fool's control. "0 Lady, crowned and sitting with the stars, I will approach thee, spite of any bars; Look on a woman's sorrow, I implore!" She cried aloud and yet again she tried, But the same power pushed her back outside, Till she went, weeping, from the open door. There was no comfort in the sunlight then, Nor any pleasure in the gifts of men. She loathed her fallen beauty most of all, Tore from the wall the prizes of her trade, The gaudy garments that had once arrayed "- A creature subject to the senses' call. Slowly she turned to where the desert lay, And there she fled, unchallenged as her way Had ever been, since, blind with sin, she came Evilly fair and insolently bold,. To mock her sisters with ill-gotten gold, Scorning all men's contempt and women's blame. But the Great Mother heard the hopeless tears, The bitter anguish of unpitied years; -;;;. ■' And lifted the pale shadow, once unclean, To where the silences are filled with light, • And" Love's celestial ministers unite ..'-'-- _,-'-- ; jii To do-His will who made her Mercy's Queen. ■.'•V-.fi •;..'-.;• • •'••: ■. *'.,-. ... *.l'-.' Ave Maria.