• St. Catherine Labouré (1876). Religious, Virgin. (Traditional) was given the Miraculous Medal by Our Lady
• St. James of the Marches (1476). Priest. (Historical)

THE small town of Montbrandon, in the Marca of Ancona, gave birth to this Saint. When young he was sent to the University of Perugia, where his progress in learning soon qualified him to be chosen preceptor to a young gentleman of Florence. Fearing that he might be engulfed in the whirlpool of worldly excesses, St. James applied himself to prayer and recollection. When traveling near Assisium, he went into the great church of the Portiuncula to pray, and being animated by the fervor of the holy men who there served God, and by the example of their blessed founder St. Francis, he determined to petition in that very place for the habit of the Order. He began his spiritual war against the devil, the world, and the flesh, with assiduous prayer and extraordinary fasts and watchings. For forty years, he never passed a day without taking the discipline. Being chosen archbishop of Milan, he fled, and could not be prevailed on to accept the office. He wrought several miracles at Venice and at other places, and raised from dangerous sicknesses the Duke of Calabria and the King of Naples. The Saint died in the convent of the Holy Trinity of his Order, near Naples, on the 28th of November, in the year 1476, being ninety years old, seventy of which he had spent in a religious state.

WORD OF THE DAY

SLAVERY. The subjection of a human being to another as a captive of war, descent from such captivity, oppression by the state, or by purchase. As an institution, it existed from the earliest times, as may be seen from certain restrictions in Mosaic legislation. The New Testament accepted the fact of slavery but introduced new principles of justice and charity that gradually removed the institution from Christian nations. But slavery, as a state of servitude by which a person is the property of another human being, has by no means disappeared. It is a fact of life in countries where doctrinaire theory, e.g., Marxism, deprives people of all rights that are not consistent with the policy of the State. (Etym. Latin sclavus, from Sclavus, Slav, from reduction to slavery of many Slavic peoples of Central Europe.)

Modern Catholic Dictionary, Fr. John Hardon SJ (Get the real one at Eternal Life — don’t accept an abridged or edited version of this masterpiece!)

Advent & The Great Truths

Advent: Short Meditations and The Great Truths Day 2 (Nov 28) The Divine Decree