Wednesday, July 18 |
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Liturgical Color: Green |
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Collect: O God, who adorned the Priest Saint Camillus with a singular grace of charity towards the sick, pour out upon us, by his merits, a spirit of love for you, so that, serving you in our neighbor, we may, at the hour of our death, pass safely over to you. Through our Lord Jesus Christ, your Son, who lives and reigns with you in the unity of the Holy Spirit, one God, for ever and ever.
Ordinary Time: July 18th
Old Calendar: St. Camillus of Lellis, confessor; St. Symphorosa and her Seven Sons, martyrs
St. Camillus, entirely without means of existence and from his early youth suffering from an incurable wound in his foot, experienced the horrors of the Roman hospitals in the sixteenth century in which the nursing and other staff were drawn from the dregs of the population. He effected a great change for the better, not content with making himself a slave of the sick and diseased he established for them a congregation of Clerks Regular pledged to this work, even when it involved those suffering from the plague, and whatever their state of life or disease.
St. Camillus died in Rome on July 14, 1614. Leo XIII proclaimed him patron of hospitals and the sick and Pius XI declared him the protector of all nuns who care for the sick. His name has been inserted in the Litany for the dying. This is also his feast according to the 1962 Missal of Bl. John XXIII the Extraordinary Form of the Roman Rite.
Today is the commemoration of St. Symphorosa and her seven Sons. St. Symphorosa was a Roman martyr of unknown date. Her tomb is on the Via Tiburtina, nine miles from Rome, together with that of seven other martyrs whom a late tradition depicts as her sons.
St. Camillus de Lellis
St. Camillus' mother was nearly sixty years old when he was born (1550). As a youth he gave himself to the sinful pleasures of this world. His conversion dates from the feast of the Purification, 1575. Two attempts to enter the Capuchin Order were frustrated by an incurable sore on his leg. In Rome St. Camillus was received in a hospital for incurables; before long he was put in charge because of his ability and zeal for virtue. He brought to the sick every imaginable kind of spiritual and bodily aid.
At the age of thirty-two he began studying for Holy Orders and was not ashamed of being numbered with children. After ordination to the holy priesthood he founded a congregation of Regular Clerics, the "Ministers to the Sick." As a fourth vow the community assumed the duty of caring for the plague-ridden at the risk of their lives. With invincible patience Camillus persevered day and night in the service of the sick, performing the meanest of duties. His love shone forth most brightly when the city of Rome was stricken by epidemic and famine, and when the plague raged at Nola. Having suffered five different maladies, which he called God's mercy, he died in Rome at the age of sixty-five. On his lips was the prayer for the dying: "May the face of Christ Jesus shine gloriously upon you." Leo XIII declared him the heavenly patron of hospitals and added his name in the litany for the dying.
Excerpted from The Church's Year of Grace, Pius Parsch
Patron: Bodily ills; hospitals; hospital workers; illness; nurses; sick people; sickness.
Symbols: red cross.
Often Portrayed As: Man with Guardian Angel
Things to Do:
St. Symphorosa and Her Seven Sons
St. Symphorosa, the wife of the holy martyr Getulius, together with her seven sons. Under Emperor Hadrian she was repeatedly struck in the face; then she was suspended by her hair, and lastly, tied to a rock, was thrown into a river. Her sons were bound to a pillar and their members disjointed with windlasses; thereupon, in various ways, they suffered martyrdom" (about the year 138). (Martyrology). Their bodies were placed in the Church of St. Michael near the fish market in Rome.
Excerpted from The Church's Year of Grace, Pius Parsch