Tuesday, March 17, 2015

Saint Patrick: "He rooted up infidelity, and planted catholicity in this country"


At my Guy Noir debriefing 5 hours ago, he pointed out the article below, declaring: "It's a bonus, I guess, of tradition ... This is terrific. I only also laugh because when I read these words I thought, "Wow! Who talks like that anymore?" But of course they don't (Notice the date for the Bishop: 1804.) LOL."

He was referring, of course, to a piece of writing by the Rev. Fr. William Gahan, O.S.A. (1732-1804) posted under the heading of "Saint Patrick: 'He rooted up infidelity, and planted catholicity in this country'" (Rorate Caeli, March 17, 2015) [emphasis from RC]:
Mementóte praepositorum Vestrorum, qui vobis locuti sunt Verbum Dei— imitamini fidem — doctrinis variis et
peregrinis nolite abduci.

Heb. c. xiii. v. 7 et 9.
Remember your Prelates, who have spoken to you the word of God—whose faith follow—and be not led away by
various and strange doctrines.

Heb. c. xiii. v. 7. 9.

When the Almighty singles out men to be the extraordinary messengers of his councils, oracles of his wisdom, instruments of his grace and channels of his boundless mercies, he confers on them those wonderful gifts, talents and virtues, that are requisite to qualify them for the execution of his orders, and for the accomplishment of the grand designs of his all ruling providence. Thus he qualified Moses, Aaron and the Prophets in the old Law, and the twelve Apostles in the new Law, for the solemn embassy and the heavenly commission on which he was pleased to send them. He invested them with every power they stood in need of, in order to discharge the duties of their ministry with success; he communicated to them all the eminent gifts and talents that were necessary, to enable them to encounter the difficulties and surmount all the obstacles which stood in their way, and which attended the due execution of the high commission they were charged with.

Among many other renowned characters and remarkable instances of this truth, we may justly rank St. Patrick, the glorious Apostle and Patron of Ireland, whose feast the Church solemnizes this day, and honours with the privilege of a plenary indulgence, extended to the faithful of the whole kingdom on every day of the ensuing octave. When the Lord in his great goodness singled him out, for the grand work of the conversion of this remote corner of the then known world to the Christian and Catholic religion, when he sent him as an instrument of his divine mercy to announce the mystery of the cross to our ancestors, and to enlighten a people, who, as the Scripture phrase expresses it, were sitting in darkness and in the gloomy shades of death, he qualified him in every respect for the arduous enterprise, and made him at once a most zealous Apostle and an illustrious Saint, that he might diffuse the light of the Gospel all over this island by his indefatigable zeal, and establish the spirit of the Gospel by his eminent sanctity. It is under these two considerations that I intend to represent St. Patrick to you at present, as a precious vessel of election and model of Christian perfection. He rooted up infidelity, and planted catholicity in this country; he banished vice and immorality, and promoted the practice of true piety and solid virtue both by his word and example. Behold the plan of the following discourse and the subject of your favourable attention. Let us previously invoke the aid of the Holy Ghost, through the intercession of the blessed Virgin, greeting her with the words of the Angel, [Ave Maria....]
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