MEMORIAL OF SAINT JOHN BAPTIST DE LA SALLE, PRIEST; SAINT HEGESIPPUS, A PRIMITIVE FATHER OF THE CHURCH AND BLESSED HERMAN JOSEPH OF SEINFELD, PRIEST – FEAST DAY: Today, we celebrate the Memorial of Saint John Baptist de la Salle, Priest (He’s a Patron Saint of Teachers; Educators; School Principals, Congregation of the Sisters of the Divine Redeemer and Institute of the Brothers of the Christian Schools Lasallian Educational Institutions.); Saint Hegesippus was a Primitive Father of the Church and Blessed Herman Joseph of Steinfeld, Priest (Patron Saint of Children; Students and Watchmakers). Through the intercession of our Blessed Mother Mary and the Saints on this feast day, we pray for all teachers, students and all children, we pray for their safety and well-being, especially during these incredibly challenging times.

Almighty God, We come to you today and give thanks for all our teachers. Thank you for the way in which they give of themselves each day in the classroom, Serving and instructing the next generation of this land. We thank you for them all now. Father, please fill teir hearts with courage now by your mighty Spirit. Fill them with your strength, so they may rise to every challenge and not grow weary. Fill them with your wisdom, so that they may be able to make good judgement when guiding and helping others. Fill them with your peace, so that when stress and anxiety comes it would not overwhelm them. Fill them with your joy, so that the passion they have for their subject may become an infectious passion that spreads. We ask all this in the wonderful name of Jesus… Amen.🙏

QUOTES OF SAINT JOHN BAPTIST DE LA SALLE

☆”The way you behave should be a model for those you teach.”
☆“When you are at Mass, be there as if you were on Calvary. For it is the same sacrifice and the same Jesus Christ Who is doing for you what He did on the Cross for all human beings.”
☆“We must strive to place ourselves completely in God’s hands. Then He will cause us to feel the effects of His goodness and protection – which are, at times extraordinary.”

“Jesus Christ came to this earth to reign here but not, says Saint Augustine, as other kings do, to raise tribute, enroll armies and visibly do battle against his enemies, for Jesus Christ assures us that His kingdom is not of this world but to establish His reign within our souls, according to what He Himself says,
in the holy Gospel, that His kingdom is within us.”

SAINT JOHN BAPTIST DE LA SALLE, PRIEST: St. John Baptist de la Salle was a French priest, educational reformer, and known for promoting and reforming Christian education, especially amongst the poor. He is also the founder of the Institute of the Brothers of Christian Schools, which now teaches around the world. St. John Baptist de la Salle is called the father of modern pedagogy. He was one of the first pedagogues to emphasize classroom teaching in the vernacular instead of in Latin. He also founded three teachers’ colleges and, in 1705, he established a reform school for boys at Dijon. Generations of schoolboys have been taught by the Christian Brothers, and their founder, St. John Baptist de la Salle, is familiar in their prayers and devotions. “Brothers Boys” are scattered all over the world and all of them have fond memories of their “De la Salle” days. St. John Baptist de la Salle (1651-1719) was born in Rheims, France, to a noble family of 10 children on April 30, 165. He was pious and smart, and his parents took great care over his moral and intellectual training. After completing his education he desired to enter the priesthood, he entered seminary and was ordained at the age of twenty-seven in 1678 and received his Doctorate in Theology in 1680. In St. John Baptist’s era, only the noble and wealthy classes had access to a good education.  Observing that the poor of his day were grossly neglected as far as their education was concerned, St. John became the first to set up training colleges for teachers who would instruct the poor. Soon after ordination he was put in charge of a girls’ school, and in 1679 he met Adrian Nyel, a layman who wanted to open a school for boys. Two schools were started, and Canon de la Salle became interested in the work of education. He took an interest in the teachers, eventually invited them to live in his own house, and tried to train them in the educational system that was forming in his mind. This first group ultimately left, unable to grasp what the saint had in mind; others, however, joined him, and the beginnings of the Brothers of the Christian Schools or Christian Brothers. They took vows of poverty, chastity, and obedience, but not Holy Orders. The Christian Brothers expanded, and in many parts of France parish priests sent young men to be trained by St. John Baptist to serve as schoolmasters in their villages.

Seeing a unique opportunity for good, Canon de la Salle resigned his canonry, gave his inheritance to the poor, and began to organize his teachers into a religious congregation. Soon, boys from his schools began to ask for admission to the Brothers, and the founder set up a juniorate to prepare them for their life as religious teachers. At the request of many pastors, he also set up a training school for teachers, first at Rheims, then at Paris, and finally at St.-Denis. Realizing that he was breaking entirely new ground in the education of the young, St. John Baptist de la Salle wrote books on his system of education, opened schools for tradesmen, and even founded a school for the nobility, at the request of King James of England.In 1695, St. John drew the Rule for his Brothers (which he later revised in 1705) and also wrote The Conduct of Christian Schools, which set forth his pedagogical system and has become a classic in the field of education. The congregation had a tumultuous history, and the setbacks that the founder had to face were many; but the work was begun, and he guided it with rare wisdom. In Lent of 1719, he grew weak, met with a serious accident, and died at St. Yon, Rouen on Good Friday, April 7, 1719. Canonized on May 24, 1900, Saint Peter’s Basilica by Pope Leo XIII and proclaimed patron of schoolteachers by Pope Pius XII in 1950. He’s the Patron Saint of Teachers; Educators; School Principals, Congregation of the Sisters of the Divine Redeemer and Institute of the Brothers of the Christian Schools Lasallian Educational Institutions.

PRAYER: Our Father, You chose St. John Baptist de la Salle as an educator of Christian youth. Give Your Church good teachers today, who will dedicate themselves to instructing young people in human and Christian disciples… Amen. Saint John Baptist de la Salle ~ Pray for us 🙏

SAINT HEGESIPPUS, A PRIMITIVE FATHER OF THE CHURCH: Saint Hegesippus was a Primitive Father of the Church (c. 110 – c. 180 AD), also known as Hegesippus the Nazarene was born in c.110 AD. Born Jewish, he became an adult convert to Christianity. He was a Christian writer of the early Church who may, in spite of his Greek name, have been a Jewish convert and certainly wrote against heresies of the Gnostics and of Marcion. Saint Hegesippus was by nation a Jew who joined the Church of Jerusalem, when the disasters attaining his unhappy land opened his eyes to see their cause. His writings were known to Saint Jerome and Eusebius and were praised by them and by all of antiquity. Saint Hegesippus journeyed to Rome, stopping to visit all important churches along his way, afterwards remaining there for nearly twenty years, where he researched the early Church, from the pontificate of Pope Saint Anicetus to that of Saint Eleutherius.

St. Hegesippus was the first to trace and record the succession of the bishops of Rome from Saint Peter to his own day, and is considered the father of ecclesiastical history. Little of his writings survive, but he was highly recommended by other early writers including Eusebius and Saint Jerome. Compiled a catalogue of heresies during the first century of Christianity. Saint Hegisippus wrote in the year 133 a history of the Church entitled Memoirs, which was composed of five books and covered the time from the Passion of Christ until that year, that is, one hundred years; the loss of this work, of which only a few fragments remain, is extremely regretted. In it he gave illustrious proofs of his faith, and placed in evidence the apostolic tradition, proving that although certain men had disturbed the Church by broaching heresies, yet even to his day no episcopal see or individual church had fallen into error. This testimony he gave after having personally visited all the principal churches, both of the East and the West, with the intention of gathering all authentic traditions concerning the life of Our Lord and of the Apostles. During the time of the latter he returned to the Orient, where he died at an advanced age, probably in Jerusalem in the year 180 AD; Jerusalem, Palaestina according to the chronicle of Alexandria.

Saint Hegesippus, a Primitive Father of the Church ~ Pray for us🙏

BLESSED HERMAN JOSEPH OF SEINFELD, PRIEST: Blessed Herman Joseph of Steinfeld (1150-1241) was a German Priest, Premonstratensian Canon regular and mystic. Born in 1150. From his earliest years, was a devoted client of the Mother of God. As a little child he used to spend all his playtime in the church at Cologne before a statue of Mary, where he received many favors. One bitter winter day, as little Herman was coming barefooted into church, his heavenly Mother, appearing to him, asked him lovingly why his feet were bare in such cold weather. Alas! dear Lady, he said, it is because my parents are so poor. She pointed to a stone, telling him to look beneath it; and there he found four silver pieces, with which the family could buy shoes. He did not forget to return and thank Her. She enjoined him to go to the same spot in all his wants, and disappeared. Never did the supply fail him; but his comrades, moved by a different spirit, could find nothing. Once Our Lady stretched out Her hand, and took an apple which the boy offered Her in pledge of his love. Another time he saw Her high up in the sanctuary, with the Holy Child and Saint John; he longed to join them, but saw no way of doing so. Suddenly he found himself placed by their side, and was able to hold sweet conversation with the Infant Jesus.

At the age of twelve he entered the Premonstratensian monastery at Steinfeld, and there led an angelic life of purity and prayer. His fellow-novices, seeing what graces he received from Mary, called him Joseph; when he shrank from so high an honor, Our Lady in a vision took him as Her spouse, and told him to accept the name. Jealously She reproved the smallest faults in Her beloved one, and for Her dowry, She conferred on him the most cruel sufferings of mind and body, which were especially severe on the great feasts of the Church. But with the cross Mary brought him the grace to bear it bravely, and thus his heart was weaned from earthly things, and he was made ready for his saintly death, which took place about on April 7, 1241. Never formally canonized, in 1958 his status as a saint of the Roman Catholic Church was formally recognized by Pope Pius XII. He’s the Patron Saint of Children; Students and Watchmakers.

Blessed Herman Joseph of Steinfeld, Priest ~ Pray for us 🙏