St. Vincent Ferrer for Our Day

sominicanLife.org ^ | Not given | James R. Motl, O.P.

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	St. Vincent Ferrer for Our Day
	by James R. Motl, O.P. Dominican Life
	A hitherto unknown disease has sprung up in China and has killed many people there.  Because of the growing popularity of international travel, the disease has now reached our continent and has claimed many lives in our part of the world. Contemporary medical practice knows no cure for this illness.  World commerce has been seriously affected.  Whereas in previous years people had been terrified of the increasing inroads of Islamic influence, now their terror is focused on this new health threat. Within five years one third of the population of the western world will be dead due to this disease.  Whole towns will be deserted.  Religious houses, which had been at the center of religious reform in recent centuries, will be emptied because many of their members in fulfilled their commitment to show God's mercy.  They went out to care for those stricken and abandoned and themselves contracted the disease and brought back to their monasteries and convents. The year is not 2003, but 1350--the year of St. Vincent Ferrer's birth.  The disease is not SARS, but the bubonic plague.  It is important for us to recognize the uncanny similarities between his time and ours because, unless we see this saint in his own time frame, it can be very difficult to understand his ministry at all.  In the first place, it is hard to identify with someone whose life was filled with miracles from its very beginning. According to hagiographies his mother experienced a painless birthing with this child, his father saw a vision telling him that his unborn child would achieve world renown, a blind woman predicted that the child would one day heal her eyesight.  The constant miracles he performed as an accompaniment to his preaching undoubtedly provided incentive to many of the thousands who followed him all over Europe to hear his preaching again and again and do public penance for their sins. In his later life, his preaching was a powerful reminder of the terror of the final judgment. I think that much of his popularity lay in the fact that these believers already knew terror.  They lived in a world devastated only a generation before by a plague known forever after as the Black Death.  Vincent did not need to bring terror to their hearts. It was already there. Today we tend to deride St. Vincent because he spoke openly of the terror that was in his listeners' hearts and minds.   Terror was not the tone of Vincent's message, however. Listen to his words as they appear in today's Office of Readings.  "Your tone of voice should be that of a father who suffers with his sinful children, as thought they were seriously ill or were lying in a huge pit; and he struggles to free them, raise them up, and cherish them like mother, as one who is happy over their progress and the hope they have for heaven's glory."  Hope in God's mercy was St. Vincent's message. It should be ours as well as we preach to people facing terror on every side.
	Related Article: Angel of the Apocalypse

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A lot of similarities between his day and our world today.

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American Cathlic's Saint of the Day

April 5, 2005

St. Vincent Ferrer

(1350?-1419)

The polarization in the Church today is a mild breeze compared with the tornado that ripped the Church apart during the lifetime of this saint. If any saint is a patron of reconciliation, Vincent Ferrer is.

Despite parental opposition, he entered the Dominican Order in his native Spain at 19. After brilliant studies, he was ordained a priest by Cardinal Peter de Luna—who would figure tragically in his life.

Of a very ardent nature, Vincent practiced the austerities of his Order with great energy. He was chosen prior of the Dominican house in Valencia shortly after his ordination.

The Western Schism divided Christianity first between two, then three, popes. Clement VII lived at Avignon in France, Urban VI in Rome. Vincent was convinced the election of Urban was invalid (though Catherine of Siena was just as devoted a supporter of the Roman pope). In the service of Cardinal de Luna, he worked to persuade Spaniards to follow Clement. When Clement died, Cardinal de Luna was elected at Avignon and became Benedict XIII.

Vincent worked for him as apostolic penitentiary and Master of the Sacred Palace. But the new pope did not resign as all candidates in the conclave had sworn to do. He remained stubborn despite being deserted by the French king and nearly all of the cardinals.

Vincent became disillusioned and very ill, but finally took up the work of simply "going through the world preaching Christ," though he felt that any renewal in the Church depended on healing the schism. An eloquent and fiery preacher, he spent the last 20 years of his life spreading the Good News in Spain, France, Switzerland, the Low Countries and Lombardy, stressing the need of repentance and the fear of coming judgment. (He became known as the "Angel of the Judgment.")

He tried, unsuccessfully, in 1408 and 1415, to persuade his former friend to resign. He finally concluded that Benedict was not the true pope. Though very ill, he mounted the pulpit before an assembly over which Benedict himself was presiding and thundered his denunciation of the man who had ordained him a priest. Benedict fled for his life, abandoned by those who had formerly supported him. Strangely, Vincent had no part in the Council of Constance, which ended the schism.

Comment:

The split in the Church at the time of Vincent Ferrer should have been fatal—36 long years of having two "heads." We cannot imagine what condition the Church today would be in if, for that length of time, half the world had followed a succession of popes in Rome, and half, an equally "official" number of popes in, say, Rio de Janeiro. It is an ongoing miracle that the Church has not long since been shipwrecked on the rocks of pride and ignorance, greed and ambition. Contrary to Lowell's words, "Truth forever on the scaffold, wrong forever on the throne," we believe that "truth is mighty, and it shall prevail"—but it sometimes takes a long time.

Quote:

“Precious stone of virginity...
Flaming torch of charity...
Mirror of penance...
Trumpet of eternal salvation...
Flower of heavenly wisdom...
Vanquisher of demons.”
(From the litanies of St. Vincent)

[.45MAN]

This is my Church here in FL.

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Great to hear from you!

And hope Florida is treating you well.

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BTTT on the Optional Memorial of St. Vincent Ferrer, April 5, 2006.

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Saint Vincent Ferrer, Priest
Optional Memorial
April 5th

St Vincent Ferrer (Griffoni Polyptych)
Francesco del Cossa
1473
Oil on panel, 153 x 60 cm
National Gallery, London

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History:
Famous Dominican missionary, born at Valencia, January 23, 1350. He was descended from the younger of two brothers who were knighted for their valor in the conquest of Valencia, 1238. In 1340 Vincent's father, William Ferrer, married Constantia Miguel, whose family had likewise been ennobled during the conquest of Valencia. Vincent was their fourth child. A brother, not unknown to history, was Boniface Ferrer, General of the Carthusians, who was employed by the antipope Benedict XIII in important diplomatic missions. Vincent was educated at Valencia, and completed his philosophy at the age of fourteen. In 1367 he entered the Dominican Order, and was sent to the house of studies at Barcelona the following year. In 1370 he taught philosophy at Lerida; one of his pupils there was Pierre Fouloup, later Grand Inquisitor of Aragon.

After this Vincent carried on his apostolic work while in Pedro de Luna's suite. At Valladolid he converted a rabbi, later well known as Bishop Paul of Burgos. At Salamanca Queen Yolanda of Aragon chose him for her confessor, 1391-1395.

St. Vincent felt that he was the messenger of penance sent to prepare men for the judgment. For twenty years he traversed Western Europe preaching penance and awakening the dormant consciences of sinners by his wondrous eloquence. His austere life was but the living expression of his doctrine. The floor was his usual bed; perpetually fasting, he arose at two in the morning to chant the Office, celebrating Mass daily, afterwards preaching, sometimes three hours, and frequently working miracles. After his midday meal he would tend the sick children; at eight o'clock he prepared his sermon for the following day. He usually traveled on foot, poorly clad. He was canonized by Calixtus III at the Dominican Church of Santa Maria Sopra Minerva, Rome, 3 June, 1455.

He died at Vannes, Brittany, April 5, 1419.

(Principal source - Catholic Encyclopedia - 1913 edition)