August 9 : Vigil of St Lawrence, martyr, Class III

St Lawrence of Rome (c. 225 – 258) was one of the seven deacons of ancient Rome who were martyred during the persecution of Valerian in 258. He is famous for his cry during his torture, "This side’s done, turn me over and have a bite."

Vigil of St Lawrence/St Teresa Benedicta of the Cross, OF (Aug 9)

Today is the feast of St Teresa Benedicta of the Cross (Edith Stein) Carmelite, martyred by the Nazis.

Also today, the vigil of St. Lawrence, martyr.

St Mary of the Cross (Class I in Australia, August 8)

Mary Helen MacKillop RSJ (15 January 1842 – 8 August 1909), or St Mary of the Cross, was an Australian nun who founded the Sisters of St Joseph of the Sacred Heart (the Josephites), a congregation of religious sisters that established a number of schools and welfare institutions throughout Australasia, with an emphasis on education for the rural poor.

Her Order was initially established on the feast day of the Presentation of Mary in 1866, and by 1871, 130 sisters were working in more than 40 schools and charitable institutions across South Australia and Queensland.

Her path was not easy: she encountered considerable opposition from bishops and priests, and  at one point was excommunicated unjustly.

She was canonised in 2010.

St Cyriacus (August 8)

From the martyrology:

"The holy martyrs Cyriacus, deacon, Largus, and Smaragdus, with twenty others who suffered on the 16th of March, during the persecution of Diocletian and Maximian. Their bodies were buried on the Salarian Way by the priest John, but were on this day translated by Pope St. Marcellus to the estate of Lucina, on the Ostian Way. Afterwards they were brought to the city and placed in the church of St. Mary in Via Lata."

St Cyriacus was a Roman nobleman who converted to Christianity as an adult and, renouncing his material wealth, gave it away to the poor. He spent the rest of his life ministering to the slaves who worked in the Baths of Diocletian.

Under the reign of Western Roman Emperor Maximian, co-emperor with Diocletian, St Cyriacus was tortured and put to death, beheaded in 303 on the Via Salaria, where he was subsequently buried. With him were martyred his companions Largus and Smaragdus, and twenty others, including Crescentianus, Sergius, Secundus, Alban, Victorianus, Faustinus, Felix, Sylvanus, and four women: Memmia, Juliana, Cyriacides, and Donata.

Saint Cyriacus is credited with exorcizing demons from two girls. The first was Artemisia (or Artemia), the daughter of Emperor Diocletian, which resulted in both Artemisia and her mother Saint Serena converting to Christianity. The second was Jobias, the daughter of Shapur II of Persia (reigned 241-272), which led to the conversion of the King's entire household.

He is one of the fourteen holy helpers.

SS Sixtus, Felicissimus and Agapitus, memorial (August 7)

c14th

Pope Sixtus II, whose name appears in the canon of the Mass, was Pope from August 30, 257 to August 6, 258, and was martyred under the Emperor Valerian. Felicissimus and Agapitus were his deacons, and were martyred with him.

August 6: Transfiguration of Our Lord, Class II

Aelbrecht Bouts, c15th

At an Angelus address, Pope Benedict XVI spoke on the significance of the Transfiguration:

"...After Jesus had foretold his Passion to the disciples, “he took with him Peter, James and John his brother, and led them up a high mountain apart. And he was transfigured before them, and his face shone like the sun, and his garments became white as light” (Mt 17:1-2). According to the senses the light of the sun is the brightest light known in nature but, according to the spirit, the disciples briefly glimpsed an even more intense splendour, that of the divine glory of Jesus which illumines the whole history of salvation. St Maximus Confessor says that “[the Lord’s] garments appear white, that is to say, the words of the Gospel will then be clear and distinct, with nothing concealed” (Ambiguum 10: PG 91, 1128 B).

The Gospel tells that beside the transfigured Jesus “there appeared... Moses and Elijah, talking with him” (Mt 17:3); Moses and Elijah, figure of the Law and of the Prophets. It was then that Peter, ecstatic, exclaimed “Lord, it is well that we are here; if you wish, I will make three booths here, one for you and one for Moses and one for Elijah” (Mt 17:4). However St Augustine commented, saying that we have only one dwelling place, Christ: “he is the Word of God, the Word of God in the Law, the Word of God in the Prophets” (Sermo De Verbis Ev. 78:3: PL 38, 491).

In fact, the Father himself proclaims: “this is my beloved Son, with whom I am well pleased; listen to him” (Mt 17:5). The Transfiguration is not a change in Jesus but the revelation of his divinity: “the profound interpenetration of his being with God, which then becomes pure light. In his oneness with the Father, Jesus is himself ‘light from light’” (Jesus of Nazareth: From the Baptism in the Jordan to the Transfiguration, Doubleday, New York, 2007, p. 310).

Peter, James and John, contemplating the divinity of the Lord, are ready to face the scandal of the Cross, as it is sung in an ancient hymn: “You were transfigured on the mountain and your disciples, insofar as they were able, contemplated your glory, in order that, on seeing you crucified, they would understand that your Passion was voluntary and proclaim to the world that you are truly the splendour of the Father” (Κοντάκιον είς τήν Μεταμόρφωσιν, in: Μηναια, t. 6, Rome 1901, 341)."

August 5: Dedication of the Church of St Mary of the Snows, Memorial



Masolino, 1383-1440

The Church of Our Lady of the Snows is better known as St Mary Major in Rome, and is one of the four papal basilicas. It was built on the site of temple to Cybele in 360, traditionally on the site of a Marian apparition, and the name refers to a miraculous fall of snow there.

The legend, according to the Catholic Encyclopedia, goes thus:

"During the pontificate of Liberius, the Roman patrician John and his wife, who were without heirs, made a vow to donate their possessions to the Virgin Mary. They prayed that she might make known to them how they were to dispose of their property in her honour. On 5 August, at the height of the Roman summer, snow fell during the night on the summit of the Esquiline Hill. In obedience to a vision of the Virgin Mary which they had the same night, the couple built a basilica in honour of Mary on the very spot which was covered with snow."

The name of the feast was changed in the 1969 calendar in response to doubts about the historicity of the legend...