Nov 11 – Memorial for St. Martin of Tours, bishop
St. Martin (316-397) was born to pagan parents. His father was a Roman military officer and tribune. Martin was raised in Pavia, Italy, where he discovered Christianity and became a catechumen in his early teens. He joined the Roman imperia army at the age of 15, serving in a ceremonial unit that acts as the emperor’s bodyguard, and was rarely exposed to combat. He became a cavalry officer and was assigned to garrison duty in Gaul.
Trying to live his faith, he refused to let his servant wait on him. Once, while on horseback in Amiens in Gaul (modern France), he encountered a beggar. Having nothing to give but the clothes on his back, he cut his heavy officer’s cloak in half, and gave it to the beggar. Later, he had a vision of Christ wearing the cloak.
Martin was baptized into the Church at the age of 18. Just before a battle, Martin announced that his faith prohibited him from fighting. Charged with cowardice, he was jailed, and his superiors planned to put him in the front of the battle. However, the invaders sued for peace, the battle never occurred, and Martin was released from military service at Worms.
On a visit to Lombardy to see his parents, he was robbed in the mountains but managed to convert one of the thieves. At home, he found that his mother had converted, but his father had not. The area was strongly Arian, and openly hostile to Catholics. Martin was badly abused by the heretics, and at one point, even by the order of the Arian bishop. Learning that the Arians had gained the upper hand in Gaul and exiled St. Hilary of Poitiers, his spiritual teacher, Martin fled to the island of Gallinaria (modern Isola d’Albenga).
In 361, Martin learned that the emperor had authorized Hilary’s return, and Martin ran to him and became a hermit for ten years in the area now know as Ligugé. A reputation for holiness attracted other monks, and they formed what would become the Benedictine abbey of Ligugé. He preached and evangelised through the Gallic countryside. Many locals held strongly to the old beliefs, and tried to intimidate Martin by dressing as the old Roman gods and appearing to him at night, but Martin continued to win converts. He destroyed old temples, and built churches on the land.
When the bishop of Tours died in 371, Martin was the immediate choice to replace him. Martin declined, citing unworthiness. Rusticus, a wealthy citizen of Tours, claimed his wife was ill and asked for Martin. When he arrived in the city, he was declared bishop by popular acclamation, and was consecrated on Jul 4, 372.
He moved to a hermit’s cell near Tours. Other monks joined him and a new house, Marmoutier, soon formed. He rarely left his monastery, but sometimes went to Trier to plead with the emperor for his city, his church, or his parishioners. Once when he went to ask lenience for a condemned prisoner, an angel woke the emperor to tell him that Martin was waiting to see him; the prisoner was reprieved.
Martin himself was given to visions, but even his contemporaries sometimes ascribed them to his habit of lengthy fasts. An extensive biography of Martin was written by Sulpicius Severus. When he died, he was buried, at his request, in the Cemetery of the Poor. Martin was the first non-martyr to receive the cultus of saint. His relics rested in the basilica of Tours, a scene of pilgrimages and miracles until 1562, when the cathedral and relics were destroyed by militant Protestants. Some small fragments on his tomb were found during construction excavation in 1860.
St. Martin of Tours is patron against poverty, alcoholism, hotel-keepers, quartermasters, soldiers, among others.
Prayer to Continue to Fight for God
“Lord, if your people still have need of my services, I will not avoid the toil. Your will be done. I have fought the good fight long enough. Yet if you bid me continue to hold the battle line in defense of your camp, I will never beg to be excused from failing strength. I will do the work you entrust to me. While you command, I will fight beneath your banner.” – St Martin of Tours, Italian Soldier, Hermit, Bishop
- Patron Saint Index
Tit 3:1-7
Lk 17:11-19
…one of them turned back praising God at the top of his voice and threw himself at the feet of Jesus and thanked him.
It is always easy to label the nine lepers in today’s Gospel passage as ‘ungrateful’ because they did not return to Jesus to thank Him, and the description is not incorrect. But when I went through the passage for today’s reflection, I realised — with guilt — that I am equally prone to such behaviour and can probably put myself in the nine lepers’ shoes.
Perhaps the lepers didn’t dare to believe that Jesus would heal them, in case they were disappointed, and hence didn’t think they had really been cleansed. Perhaps they were so narrowly focused on going to the priests to obtain healing that they didn’t even notice they had already been healed, in ways they hadn’t expected. Or perhaps they did notice that they had been cleansed, but were already too preoccupied with their next pressing problem to come back. The second and third options are particularly applicable for me whenever I feel anxious or stressed, to the point that I wonder whether God gets tired of listening to my endless fretting.
Along the same lines, I also felt rather attacked (in a good way!) by Fr Mike Schmitz’s homily on the battle of prayer (here from 7:40 onwards) where he commented that we often allocate far more time and effort to our petitions than to thanksgiving. It made me wonder why I seem to find far more ‘standard’ prayers for novenas than thanksgiving online, unless I wasn’t searching hard enough. Nonetheless, it made me acknowledge that this is yet another unhealthy mindset I lapse into more often than I would like — towards both our Lord, and those around me. Perhaps this is simply an illustration of our instinct to focus on what we do not have instead of what we do, as part of our aversion to loss. But Fr Mike’s words gained resonance when a priest asked us in a recent homily, whether we would enjoy being with a friend who spent every gathering talking about her own troubles and making requests, which is an image I ought to keep in mind when I make my next petition.
Another daily reflection I just read (here) also provided a deeper insight on the nature of our gratitude to God; how we ought to praise and thank Him for his presence and not just because of our circumstances, how we ought to spend time with Him in prayer to be with Him and get to know Him better, instead of simply concentrating on overly long wish lists. It is a challenging call for me to reflect on why exactly I pray, which I will need to rely on the Holy Spirit’s guidance and wisdom for.
(Today’s OXYGEN by Jaclyn Lam)
Prayer: Jesus, help us to appreciate how You came to have a relationship with us. Teach us how to praise and thank You because You are good, and not just because of all You have done for us.
Thanksgiving: Lord, thank you for this day, and for the grace to start anew. Forgive us for the times we have taken You and your gifts for granted and not expressed our gratitude.
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