Collect of the Day: St. Francis Xavier

St. Francis Xavier
Confessor

From

The Liturgical Year

by Dom Guéranger, O.S.B.

The apostles being the heralds of the coming of the Messias, it was fitting that Advent should have in its calendar the name of some one among them. Divine Providence has provided for this; for, to say nothing of St. Andrew, whose feast is oftentimes past before the season of Advent has commenced, St. Thomas’s day is unfailingly kept immediately before Christmas. We will explain, later on, why St. Thomas holds that position rather than any other apostle; at present, we simply assert the fitness of there being at least one of the apostolic college, who should announce to us, in this period of the Catholic cycle, the coming of the Redeemer. But God has not wished that the first apostolate should be the only one to appear on the first page of the liturgical calendar; great also, though in a lower degree, is the glory of that second apostolate, whereby the bride of Jesus Christ multiplies her children, even in her fruitful old age, as the psalmist expresses it. There are Gentiles who have still to be evangelized; for the coming of the Messias is far from having been announced to all nations. Now of all the valiant messengers of the divine Word who have, during the last few hundred years, proclaimed the good tidings among infidel nations, there is not one whose glory is greater, who has worked greater wonders, or who has shown himself a closer imitator of the first apostles, than the modern apostle of the Indies, St. Francis Xavier.

The life and apostolate of this wonderful man were a great triumph for our mother the holy Catholic Church; for St. Francis came just at a period when heresy, encouraged by false learning, by political intrigues, by covetousness, and by all the wicked passions of the human heart, seemed on the eve of victory. Emboldened by all these, this enemy of God spoke, with the deepest contempt, of that ancient Church which rested on the promises of Jesus Christ; it declared that she was unworthy of the confidence of men, and dared even to call her the harlot of Babylon, as though the vices of her children could taint the purity of the mother. God’s time came at last, and He showed Himself in His power: the garden of the Church suddenly appeared rich in the most admirable fruits of sanctity. Heroes and heroines issued from that apparent barrenness; and whilst the pretended reformers showed themselves to be the most wicked of men, two countries, Italy and Spain, gave to the world the most magnificent saints.

One of these is brought before us today, claiming our love and our praise. The calendar of the liturgical year will present to us, from time to time, his contemporaries and his companions in divine grace and heroic sanctity. The sixteenth century is, therefore, worthy of comparison with any other age of the Church. The so-called reformers of those times gave little proof of their desire to convert infidel countries, when their only zeal was to bury Christianity beneath the ruin of her churches. But at that very time, a society of apostles was offering itself to the Roman Pontiff, that he might send them to plant the true faith among people who were sitting in the thickest of death. But, we repeat, not one of these holy men so closely imitated the first apostles as did Francis, the disciple of Ignatius. He had all the marks and labours of an apostle: an immense world of people evangelized by his zeal, hundreds of thousands of infidels baptized by his indefatigable ministration, and miracles of every kind, which proved him, to the infidel, to be marked with the sign which they received who, living in the flesh, planted the Church, as the Church speaks in her liturgy. So that, in the sixteenth century, the east received from the ever holy city of Rome an apostle, who, by his character and his works, resembled those earlier ones sent her by Jesus Himself. May our Lord Jesus be forever praised for having vindicated the honour of the Church, His bride, by raising up Francis Xavier, and giving to men, in this His servant, a representation of what the first apostles were, whom He sent to preach the Gospel when the whole world was pagan.

Let us now read the short account given us, in the words of the Church, of this new apostle.

Francis was of noble family, and was born in the castle of Xavier, in the diocese of Pampeluna, in the year of our Lord 1506. He was a companion of St Ignatius at Paris, and one of his earliest disciples. Under his teaching, he learnt to become so wrapt in the contemplation of divine things, that he was sometimes lifted in ecstasy off the ground, which happened to him several times when he was saying Mass in public before large congregations. He earned these refreshments of the soul by the sharpest punishment of the body. He gave up the use not only of meat and wine, but also of wheaten bread; he lived on the vilest food, and ate only once every two or three days. He used an iron scourge till his blood ran freely; he shortened the hours of his rest, and lay only on the ground.

The hardness and holiness of his life had made him meet to be called to be an Apostle, and when John III., King of Portugal, asked Pope Paul III. to send to the Indies some members of the then new Society of Jesus, the Pontiff, by the advice of St Ignatius, sent Francis to enter on that vast field of labour with the powers of Apostolic Nuncio. He arrived (in India on the 6th day of May, in the year 1542.) When he began his work, it seemed as though God Himself taught him the many and difficult languages of the natives. It even happened that when he preached in one language to a mixed congregation of different nationalities, each one heard him in his own tongue wherein he was born. He travelled over countless districts, always walking, and often bare-footed. He introduced the faith into Japan, and six other countries. In India he turned many hundred thousands to Christ, and regenerated many chiefs and kings in the holy font. And notwithstanding that he was doing all these great things for God's service, so deep was his lowliness that when he wrote to St Ignatius, the General of the Society, he did so on his knees.

God was pleased to support his zeal for spreading the Gospel with many and great miracles. He gave sight to a blind man. On one occasion the supply of fresh water failed when he was at sea, and five hundred sailors were in danger of perishing by thirst, but the servant of God, by the sign of the Cross, turned salt water into fresh, and they used it for a considerable time. Some of this water was also carried into different countries, and a great number of sick persons were instantaneously cured by it. He called several dead men to life, among whom was one who had been buried the day before, and who was disinterred by command of the saint; and likewise two others who were being carried to the grave, and whom he took by the hand and restored living to their parents. He had the spirit of prophecy, and foretold many things, remote both in place and time. Utterly worn out with his labours, he died full of good works in the island of San-Chan in the Canton River, (upon the 2nd day of December, in the year of our Lord 1552.) His body was buried in quick lime, and, being again taken up, was again buried in the same, but at the end of many months it was found entirely incorrupt, and sweet, and, when cut, blood flowed freely from it. From China it was carried to Malacca, and, as soon as it reached that place, a plague, which was raging there, ceased. At length, when he had become famous throughout the whole world for new and wonderful miracles, Gregory XV. added his name to the list of the Saints.

Glorious apostle of Jesus Christ, who didst impart His divine light to the nations that were sitting in the shadows of death! We, though unworthy of the name of Christians, address our prayers to thee, that by the charity which led thee to sacrifice everything for the conversion of souls, thou wouldst deign to prepare us for the visit of the Saviour, whom our faith and our love desire. Thou was the father of infidel nations; be the protector, during this holy season, of them that believe in Christ. Before thy eyes had contemplated the Lord Jesus, thou didst make Him known to countless people; now that thou seest Him face to face, obtain for us that, when He is come, we may see Him with that simple and ardent faith of the Magi, those glorious first-fruits of the nations to which thou didst bear the admirable light.

Remember also, O great apostle, those nations which thou didst evangelize, and where now, by a terrible judgment of God, the word of life has ceased to bring forth fruit. Pray for the vast empire of China, on which thou didst look when dying, but which was not blessed with thy preaching. Pray for Japan, thy dear garden which has been laid waste by the savage wild beast, of which the psalmist speaks. May the blood of the martyrs, which was poured out on that land like water, bring it the long-expected fertility. Bless, too, all the missions which our holy mother the Church has undertaken in those lands where the cross has not yet triumphed. May the heart of the infidel be opened to the grand simplicity and light of faith; may the seed bring forth fruit a hundred-fold; may the number of thy successors in the new apostolate ever increase; may their zeal and charity fail not; may their toil receive its reward of abundant fruit; and may the crown of martyrdom, which they receive, be not only the recompense but the perfection and the triumph of their apostolic ministry. Recommend to our Lord the innumerable members of that Association, which is the means of the faith being propagated through the world, and which has thee for its patron. Pray, with a filial affection and earnestness, for that holy Society, of which thou art so bright an ornament, and which reposes on thee its firmest confidence. May it more and more flourish under the storm of trial which never leaves it at rest; may it be multiplied, that so the children of God may be multiplied by its labours; may it ever have ready, for the service of the Christian world, zealous apostles and doctors; may it not be in vain that it bears the name of Jesus.

Let us consider the wretched condition of the human race, at the time of Christ’s coming into the world. The diminution of truths is emphatically expressed by the little light which the earth enjoys at this season of the year. The ancient traditions are gradually becoming extinct; the Creator is not acknowledged. Even in the very work of His hands; everything has been made God, except the God who made all things. This frightful pantheism produces the vilest immortality, both in society at large, and in individuals. There are no rights acknowledged, save that of might. Lust, avarice, and theft, are honoured by men in the gods of their altars. There is no such thing as family, for divorce and infanticide are legalized; mankind is degraded by a general system of slavery; nations are being exterminated by endless wars. The human race is in the last extreme of misery; and unless the hand that created it reform it, it must needs sink a prey to crime and bloodshed. There are indeed some few just men still left upon the earth, and they struggle against the torrent of universal degradation; but they cannot save the world; the world despises them, and God will not accept their merits as a palliation of the hideous leprosy which covers the earth. All flesh has corrupted its way, and is more guilty than even in the days of the deluge: and yet, a second destruction of the universe would but manifest anew the justice of God; it is time that a deluge of His divine mercy should flood the universe, and that He who made man, should come down and heal him. Come then, O eternal Son of God! Give life again to this dead body; heal all its wounds; purify it; let grace superabound, where sin before abounded; and having converted the world to Thy holy law, Thou wilt have proved to all ages that Thou, who camest, was in very truth the Word of the Father; for as none but a God could create the world, so none but the same omnipotent God could save it from Satan and sin, and restore it to justice and holiness.

A Responsory of Advent

(The Roman breviary, fourth Sunday of Advent)

 R. Behold! How great is he that cometh in to save the nations; he is the King of justice, Whose generation hath no end.
 V. He comes in as our precursor, made Priest forever according to the order of Melchisedech; Whose generation hath no end.

The Vision of St. Francis Xavier by Baciccio, 1675

Commemoration of

Tuesday in the First Week of Advent

From
The Liturgical Year
by Dom Guéranger, O.S.B.

Come, let us adore the King our Lord, who is to come.

From the Prophet Isaias (Is. 2. 1-3)

The word that Isaias the son of Amos saw, concerning Juda and Jerusalem. And in the last days the mountain of the house of the Lord shall be prepared on the top of mountains, and it shall be exalted above the hills, and all nations shall flow unto it. And many people shall go, and say: Come and let us go up to the mountain of the Lord, and to the house of the God of Jacob, and he will teach us his ways, and we will walk in his paths: for the law shall come forth from Sion, and the word of the Lord from Jerusalem.

How the Church loves to hear and say these grand words of the prophet: Come, let us go up to the mountain of the Lord! She repeats them in the Lauds of every feria in Advent; and her children bless the Lord, who, that we might have no difficulty in finding Him, has made Himself like to a high mountain; high, indeed, yet can we all ascend it. It is true that, at first, this moutain is, as we learn from another prophet, a small stone which is scarcely perceptible, and this to show the humility of the Messias at His birth; but it soon becomes great, and all people see it, and are invited to dwell on its fertile slopes, yea, to go up to its very summit, bright with the rays of the Sun of justice. It is thus, O Jesus, that Thou callest us all, and that Thou approachest towards all, and the greatness and sublimity of Thy mysteries are put within the reach of our littleness. We desire to join, without delay, that happy multitude of people which is journeying on towards Thee; we are already with them; we are resolved to fix our tent under Thy shadow, O Mountain ever blessed! There shelter us, and let us be out of reach of the noise of the world beneath us. Suffer us to go so far up, tht we may lose all sight of that same world's vanities. May we never forget those paths which lead even to the blissful summit, where the mountain, the figure, disappears, and the soul finds herself face to face with Him, whose vision eternally keeps the angels in rapture, and whose delight is to be with the children of men!

The Prophet Isaias by Lorenzo Monaco, 1405

Introit - Psalms, 118. 46-47; 116. 1-2

I will speak of Your decrees before kings without being ashamed. And I will delight in Your commands, which I love exceedingly.
Praise the Lord, all you nations; glorify Him, all you peoples! For steadfast is His kindness toward us, and the fidelity of the Lord endures forever.
V. Glory be to the Father, and to the Son, and to the Holy Ghost.
R. As it was in the beginning, is now, and ever shall be, world without end. Amen.

I will speak of Your decrees before kings without being ashamed. And I will delight in Your commands, which I love exceedingly.

Collect of the Day

Deus, qui Indiárum gentes beáti Francísci prædicatióne et miráculis Ecclésiæ tuæ aggregáre voluísti: concéde propítius; ut, cuius gloriósa mérita venerámur, virtútum quoque imitémur exémpla. Per Dominum nostrum Iesum Christum, Filium tuum: qui tecum vivit et regnat in unitate Spiritus Sancti Deus, per omnia saecula saeculorum. Amen.

O God, You Who were pleased to gather into Your Church the peoples of the Indies by the preaching and miracles of blessed Francis, mercifully grant that we, who honor his glorious merits, may also imitate the example of his virtues. Through Jesus Christ, thy Son our Lord, Who liveth and reigneth with thee, in the unity of the Holy Ghost, ever one God, world without end. Amen.

Commemoration of the Feria in the First Week of Advent

Put forth Your power, O Lord, we beseech You, and come, that with You as our protector we may be rescued from the impending danger of our sins; and with You as our deliverer, may we obtain our salvation. Who livest and reignest with God the Father, in the unity of the Holy Spirit, one God, world without end. Amen.

Epistle - Romans, 10. 10-18

Brethren: With the heart a man believes unto justice, and with the mouth profession of faith is made unto salvation. For the Scripture says, Whoever believes in Him shall not be disappointed. For there is no distinction between Jew and Greek, for there is the same Lord of all, rich toward all who call upon Him. For whoever calls upon the name of the Lord shall be saved. How then are they to call upon him in Whom they have not believed? But how are they to believe Him Whom they have not heard? And how are they to hear, if no one preaches? And how are men to preach unless they be sent? As it is written, How beautiful are the feet of those who preach the Gospel of peace; of those who bring glad tidings of good things! But all did not obey the Gospel. For Isaiah says, Lord, who has believed our report? Faith, then, depends on hearing, and hearing on the word of Christ. But I say: Have they not heard? Yes, indeed, Their voice has gone forth into all the earth, and their words unto the ends of the world.

Gradual - Psalms, 91. 13-14, 3; James, 1. 12

The just man shall flourish like the palm tree, like a cedar of Lebanon shall he grow in the house of the Lord.
To proclaim Your kindness at dawn and Your faithfulness throughout the night. Alleluia, alleluia.
V. Blessed is the man who endures temptation; for when he has been tried, he will receive the crown of life. Alleluia.

Gospel - St. Mark, 16. 15-18

At that time, Jesus said to His disciples, Go into the whole world and preach the gospel to every creature. He who believes and is baptized shall be saved, but he who does not believe shall be condemned. And these signs shall attend those who believe: in My name they shall cast out devils; they shall speak in new tongues; they shall take up serpents; and if they drink any deadly thing, it shall not hurt them; they shall lay hands upon the sick and they shall get well.

Offertory - Psalms, 88. 25

My faithfulness and My kindness shall be with him, and through My name shall his horn be exalted.

Secret

Grant, we beseech You, O almighty God, that the offering we make of our lowliness may be pleasing to You for the honor of Your saints, and at the same time may it cleanse us in body and mind. Through Jesus Christ, thy Son our Lord, Who liveth and reigneth with thee, in the unity of the Holy Ghost, ever one God, world without end. Amen.

Commemoration of the Feria in the First Week of Advent

May these offerings, O Lord, cleanse us by their mighty power and thus make us come purer before You Who are their author. Through Jesus Christ, thy Son our Lord, Who liveth and reigneth with thee, in the unity of the Holy Ghost, ever one God, world without end. Amen.

Preface - Common

It is truly meet and just, and profitable unto salvation, that we should at all times, and in all places, give thanks to thee, O Holy Lord, Father Almighty, eternal God, through Christ, our Lord. Though whom the angels praise thy majesty, the dominions adore it, the powers are in awe. Which the heavens and the hosts of heaven together with the blessed seraphim joyfully do magnify. And do thou command that it be permitted to us to join with them in confessing thee, while we say with lowly praise:

Sanctus, Sanctus, Sanctus Dóminus, Deus Sábaoth. Pleni sunt coeli et terra glória tua. Hosánna in excélsis. Benedíctus, qui venit in nómine Dómini. Hosánna in excélsis.

The Crucifixion with the Blessed Virgin Mary and St. John the Evangelist by Antonio da Firenza,  circa 1450.

Communion - St. Matthew, 24. 46-47

Blessed is that servant, whom his master, when he comes, shall find watching. Amen I say to you, he will set him over all his goods.

Post Communion

We beseech You, O almighty God, that we who have eaten the food of heaven may find in it, by the intercession of blessed Francis, Your confessor, strength against all harm. Through Jesus Christ, thy Son our Lord, Who liveth and reigneth with thee, in the unity of the Holy Ghost, ever one God, world without end. Amen.

Commemoration of the Feria in the First Week of Advent

May we receive Your mercy, O Lord, in the midst of Your temple, and thus prepare with due observance for the coming festal season of our redemption. Through Jesus Christ, thy Son our Lord, Who liveth and reigneth with thee, in the unity of the Holy Ghost, ever one God, world without end. Amen.

The Death of St. Francis Xavier by Massimiliano Soldani Benzi, 1690

December 3.—ST. FRANCIS XAVIER.

YOUNG Spanish gentleman, in the dangerous days of the Reformation, was making a name for himself as a Professor of Philosophy in the University of Paris, and had seemingly no higher aim, when St. Ignatius of Loyola won him to heavenly thoughts. After a brief apostolate amongst his countrymen in Rome he was sent by St. Ignatius to the Indies, where for twelve years he was to wear himself out, bearing the Gospel to Hindostan, to Malacca, and to Japan. Thwarted by the jealousy, covetousness, and carelessness of those who should have helped and encouraged him, neither their opposition nor the difficulties of every sort which he encountered could make him slacken his labors for souls. The vast kingdom of China appealed to his charity, and he was resolved to risk his life to force an entry, when God took him to Himself, and on the 2d of December, 1552, he died, like Moses, in sight of the land of promise.

Reflection.—Some are specially called to work for souls; but there is no one who cannot help much in their salvation. Holy example, earnest intercession, the offerings of our actions in their behalf—all this needs only the spirit which animated St. Francis Xavier, the desire to make some return to God.

St. Francis Xavier by Andrea Pozzo, 1701