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Never Tire of Trying
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Weedy
May 18, 2013, 1:58:35 PM5/18/13
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Never Tire of Trying
"Be assured that you can never be perfect in this world unless you realize that it is impossible for you to be perfect here. Therefore, your aim in life should be as follows.
Always try your best in doing what you have to do, so that you may reach perfection. Never get tired of trying, because there is always room for improvement."
Commentary on Psalm 33, 14
Prayer: How do I seek you, O Lord? For when I seek you, it is happiness I seek. Let me seek you that my soul may live; as my body lives by my soul, so my soul lives by you.
Confessions 10, 20
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May 18th - SS. Theodotus, Thecusa and their Companions, Martyrs
d. 304?
LIKE many other narratives which have found more or less authoritative acceptance both in the Eastern and Western church, the story of SS. Theodotus, Thecusa and their companions is not historical fact but a pious romance. Shorn of many picturesque details, the tale runs as follows: Theodotus was a charitable and devout Christian who had been brought up by a maiden called Thecusa; he plied the trade of an innkeeper at Ancyra in Galatia. The faithful in this province, during the persecution of Diocletian, suffered terribly at the hands of a particularly cruel governor. Theodotus fearlessly assisted the imprisoned Christians and buried the martyrs at the risk of his life. He was bearing back the relics of St. Valens, which he had rescued from the river Halys, when he encountered, near the town of Malus, a party of Christians who had recently regained their liberty through his exertions. They were overjoyed at the meeting, and sat down to an alfresco meal, to which they invited Fronto, the local Christian priest. In the course of conversation, Theodotus remarked that the place would be an ideal site for a confessio or chapel for relics.
“Yes”, was the priest’s reply, “but you must first have the relics”. “Build the church”, said Theodotus, “and I will provide the relics.” With these words he gave Fronto his ring as a pledge.
Soon afterwards there occurred in Ancyra an annual feast to Artemis and Athene, during the course of which statues of the goddesses were washed at a pond, in which women consecrated to their service bathed in view of the public. There happened to be at that time imprisoned in the town seven Christian maidens, amongst whom was Thecusa. The governor, who had been unable to shake their constancy, condemned them to be stripped, to be carried naked in an open chariot after the idols, and then to be drowned in the pond, unless they consented to wear the garlands and robes of the priestesses. As they indignantly refused to do this, the sentence was carried out, stones having been attached to the necks of the martyrs to prevent their bodies from rising. However, Theodotus recovered them one tempestuous night while the guards were sheltering from the storm, and gave them Christian burial. The secret was betrayed by an apostate, and Theodotus, after being subjected to appalling tortures, was decapitated.
Now it came to pass on the day of his friend’s death that the priest Fronto had occasion to come to Ancyra with his ass to sell wine. Night had fallen when he arrived, and as the gates were closed he gladly accepted the hospitality of a little band of soldiers encamped outside the city. In the course of conversation he discovered that they were guarding the pyre on which the body of the dead Theodotus was to be burnt on the morrow. Thereupon he plied them with his wine till they were completely intoxicated and, after replacing the ring on its former owner’s finger, he laid the body of Theodotus across the back of his ass which he set at liberty, well knowing that it would return home. In the morning he loudly bewailed the theft of the ass and thus escaped suspicion. The animal, as he had anticipated, bore its burden back to Malus, and there the confessio which Theodotus had desired was built to enshrine his own remains.
It might be said without exaggeration that the attitude adopted by modern scholars towards the story of Theodotus is typical of the change which has come over the whole science of hagiography. Alban Butler, following the footsteps of such generally sound authorities as Ruinart, the early Bollandists and Tillemont, believed that this narrative was written by one Nilus, “who had lived with the martyr, had been his fellow prisoner and was an eye-witness of what he relates”. But there are grave reasons for believing that Nilus has merely been invented by an artifice common to all fiction, and that the story, with its reminiscences of a tale occurring in Herodotus, must be treated as a romance written by an author possessing rather more literary skill than we commonly find in such cases. See Delehaye in the Analecta Bollandiana, vol. xxii (1903), pp. 320-328 and vol. xxiii (1904), pp. 478-479. The texts are best given in P. Franchi de’ Cavalieri Studi e Testi, no. 6 (5901), and no. 33 (5920). See also the Acta Sanctorum, May, vol. iv, and the Revue des Questions historiques, vol. xviii (1904), pp. 288-291.
Saint Quote:
"There are some characters which appear very gentle as long as everything goes well with them; but at the touch of any adversity or contradiction, they are immediately enkindled, and begin to throw forth smoke like a volcano. Such as these may be called burning coals hidden under ashes. This is not the meekness which Our Lord aimed to teach, that He might make us like Himself. We ought to be like lilies among thorns, which, though they come from amid such sharp points, do not cease to be smooth and pliable"
--St. Bernard
This virtue also shone forth in St Jane Frances de Chantal When she was, on various occasions, ill-treated by many, she never showed the least sign of resentment or displeasure, but in return gave presents to one, bestowed favors obtained from God or from persons of rank, upon another. Nor was her love for any of them diminished.
(Taken from the book "A Year with the Saints". May—Meekness)
<><><><>
The Angelic Trisagion:
Holy, holy, holy Lord God of hosts! The earth is full of Thy Glory! Glory be to the Father, Glory be to the Son, Glory be to the Holy Ghost. Amen.
"Be assured that you can never be perfect in this world unless you realize that it is impossible for you to be perfect here. Therefore, your aim in life should be as follows.
Always try your best in doing what you have to do, so that you may reach perfection. Never get tired of trying, because there is always room for improvement."
Commentary on Psalm 33, 14
Prayer: How do I seek you, O Lord? For when I seek you, it is happiness I seek. Let me seek you that my soul may live; as my body lives by my soul, so my soul lives by you.
Confessions 10, 20
<<>><<>><<>>
May 18th - SS. Theodotus, Thecusa and their Companions, Martyrs
d. 304?
LIKE many other narratives which have found more or less authoritative acceptance both in the Eastern and Western church, the story of SS. Theodotus, Thecusa and their companions is not historical fact but a pious romance. Shorn of many picturesque details, the tale runs as follows: Theodotus was a charitable and devout Christian who had been brought up by a maiden called Thecusa; he plied the trade of an innkeeper at Ancyra in Galatia. The faithful in this province, during the persecution of Diocletian, suffered terribly at the hands of a particularly cruel governor. Theodotus fearlessly assisted the imprisoned Christians and buried the martyrs at the risk of his life. He was bearing back the relics of St. Valens, which he had rescued from the river Halys, when he encountered, near the town of Malus, a party of Christians who had recently regained their liberty through his exertions. They were overjoyed at the meeting, and sat down to an alfresco meal, to which they invited Fronto, the local Christian priest. In the course of conversation, Theodotus remarked that the place would be an ideal site for a confessio or chapel for relics.
“Yes”, was the priest’s reply, “but you must first have the relics”. “Build the church”, said Theodotus, “and I will provide the relics.” With these words he gave Fronto his ring as a pledge.
Soon afterwards there occurred in Ancyra an annual feast to Artemis and Athene, during the course of which statues of the goddesses were washed at a pond, in which women consecrated to their service bathed in view of the public. There happened to be at that time imprisoned in the town seven Christian maidens, amongst whom was Thecusa. The governor, who had been unable to shake their constancy, condemned them to be stripped, to be carried naked in an open chariot after the idols, and then to be drowned in the pond, unless they consented to wear the garlands and robes of the priestesses. As they indignantly refused to do this, the sentence was carried out, stones having been attached to the necks of the martyrs to prevent their bodies from rising. However, Theodotus recovered them one tempestuous night while the guards were sheltering from the storm, and gave them Christian burial. The secret was betrayed by an apostate, and Theodotus, after being subjected to appalling tortures, was decapitated.
Now it came to pass on the day of his friend’s death that the priest Fronto had occasion to come to Ancyra with his ass to sell wine. Night had fallen when he arrived, and as the gates were closed he gladly accepted the hospitality of a little band of soldiers encamped outside the city. In the course of conversation he discovered that they were guarding the pyre on which the body of the dead Theodotus was to be burnt on the morrow. Thereupon he plied them with his wine till they were completely intoxicated and, after replacing the ring on its former owner’s finger, he laid the body of Theodotus across the back of his ass which he set at liberty, well knowing that it would return home. In the morning he loudly bewailed the theft of the ass and thus escaped suspicion. The animal, as he had anticipated, bore its burden back to Malus, and there the confessio which Theodotus had desired was built to enshrine his own remains.
It might be said without exaggeration that the attitude adopted by modern scholars towards the story of Theodotus is typical of the change which has come over the whole science of hagiography. Alban Butler, following the footsteps of such generally sound authorities as Ruinart, the early Bollandists and Tillemont, believed that this narrative was written by one Nilus, “who had lived with the martyr, had been his fellow prisoner and was an eye-witness of what he relates”. But there are grave reasons for believing that Nilus has merely been invented by an artifice common to all fiction, and that the story, with its reminiscences of a tale occurring in Herodotus, must be treated as a romance written by an author possessing rather more literary skill than we commonly find in such cases. See Delehaye in the Analecta Bollandiana, vol. xxii (1903), pp. 320-328 and vol. xxiii (1904), pp. 478-479. The texts are best given in P. Franchi de’ Cavalieri Studi e Testi, no. 6 (5901), and no. 33 (5920). See also the Acta Sanctorum, May, vol. iv, and the Revue des Questions historiques, vol. xviii (1904), pp. 288-291.
Saint Quote:
"There are some characters which appear very gentle as long as everything goes well with them; but at the touch of any adversity or contradiction, they are immediately enkindled, and begin to throw forth smoke like a volcano. Such as these may be called burning coals hidden under ashes. This is not the meekness which Our Lord aimed to teach, that He might make us like Himself. We ought to be like lilies among thorns, which, though they come from amid such sharp points, do not cease to be smooth and pliable"
--St. Bernard
This virtue also shone forth in St Jane Frances de Chantal When she was, on various occasions, ill-treated by many, she never showed the least sign of resentment or displeasure, but in return gave presents to one, bestowed favors obtained from God or from persons of rank, upon another. Nor was her love for any of them diminished.
(Taken from the book "A Year with the Saints". May—Meekness)
<><><><>
The Angelic Trisagion:
Holy, holy, holy Lord God of hosts! The earth is full of Thy Glory! Glory be to the Father, Glory be to the Son, Glory be to the Holy Ghost. Amen.
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