You’ve gotta love it when it seems like the Holy Spirit is leading you through your workweek, making the job easier and the product better.
My turn to lead morning prayer for the Florida Catholic state office staff came up again yesterday and today and, as regular readers of Living Faith may know, that means I checked my Catholic calendar for inspiration from the saint for the day. Through sleepy, 5:30 eyes yesterday morning, I noticed that both the Aug. 18 and Aug. 19 blocks on the Church calendar hanging on my fridge were blank. But I had no fear; I knew a copy of “Butler’s Lives of the Saints” (Concise, Modernized Edition, edited by Bernard Bangley) awaited on my office shelf at the other end of my 62-mile morning commute.
Meanwhile, somewhere along Interstate 4, my mind ticked through other items remaining on my to-do list for the week, such as selecting the next subject for the historical profile that’s a regular feature on our new “Year for Priests” page in the Florida Catholic’s print editions.
It all came together when I got to the office and started to prepare for prayer by opening the “Butler’s” book. The saints listed for Aug. 18 and Aug. 19, respectively, are Chilean St. Alberto Hurtado Cruchaga (1901-52) and French St. John Eudes (1601-80) - both priests!
According to the book and various online biographies, Father Hurtado’s father died when Father Hurtado was 4, leaving him and his mother impoverished and sometimes homeless. After receiving a scholarship to attend the Jesuit College in Santiago, he joined the order and became a priest, devoting his ministry to serving the poor. He founded a shelter for homeless and abandoned children - a Chilean version of Boys Town - and a Christian labor union. An Aug. 18 posting on Whosoever Desires, a multiauthor Jesuit blog, includes a soul-challenging reflection from the saint himself.
For someone who’s been dead for more than 300 years, Father Eudes - known as an outstanding speaker, writer and missionary who devoted his life to finding lost souls, and training and educating other priests to do the same - received a fair amount of attention from bloggers for his feast day, too. Today’s post on A Penitent Blogger had this interesting take on him: “He was often seen in the company of prostitutes and he went by the name of ‘John.’ It wasn’t what one might think: He was a priest.” And Denise Bossert in today’s Catholic by Grace, posted a beautiful quote by him on the Eucharist.
So, the Holy Spirit has offered me an abundance of options. Living Faith readers, as I head out for my return trip home on the highway, help me choose. Which of these saintly priests should be the subject of the “Year for Priests” page profile this time?
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It is so difficult to choose. A priest who rose above his circumstances to acquire a scholarship and go forth to found the home for boys is certainly someone worth looking at in today’s world when so many use their impoverished or troubled backgrounds as an excuse instead of a motivator. Yet, what the other priest accomplished was amazing and admirable, too.
I would say Father Hurtado because of the double angle of rising above childhood circumstance as well as helping other boys to do the same.
Great post.
Evie