MEMORIAL OF SAINT JEROME, PRIEST AND DOCTOR OF THE CHURCH: Today, we celebrate the Memorial of Saint Jerome, Priest and Doctor of the Church. Through the intercession of our Blessed Mother Mary and Saint Jerome on this feast day, we humbly pray for the safety and well-being of our children, we pray for all students, teachers, librarians, Bible Scholars and all those who proclaim the Gospel. We pray for the sick and dying, especially those who are sick mentally and physically ill and those suffering from cancers and other terminal diseases. We pray for the souls in Purgatory and the repose of the souls of the faithful departed. We pray for all widows and widowers. We pray for the poor and needy, for peace, love, and unity in our marriages, our families and our world. And we continue to pray for our Holy Father, the Bishops, the Clergy, for vocations to the priesthood and religious life, for the Church, for persecuted christians, for the conversion of sinners, and Christians all over the world… Amen🙏

SAINT JEROME, PRIEST AND DOCTOR OF THE CHURCH: St. Jerome (347 – 420), Priest, Monk and Doctor of the Church, one of the greatest Biblical scholars of Christendom, renowned for his extraordinary depth of learning and translations of the Bible into Latin in the Vulgate. St. Jerome was born to a wealthy pagan family at Stridon in Dalmatia around the year 347. Educated at the local school, he then he was sent to Rome for his schooling for eight years, there converted to Christianity, being baptized by Pope Liberius. In Rome he studied theology, Latin and Greek, devoted himself to oratory, and finally pleaded at the bar. For a time he gave himself up to the world, but his piety returned to him after he began to travel. He traveled widely to the important intellectual and theological centers across the newly-established Christian Empire. Having made a tour of Gaul, he went again to Rome, where he received Baptism, which at that time was frequently deferred until a mature age. Whether this Sacrament was administered before or after his journey to Gaul is not certain. From Rome, he journeyed to the East, and visited the Anchorites and other persons of sanctity. After sojourning a while at Antioch, he took up his abode in the desert of Chalcis in Syria, with the holy Abbot Theodosius. Here he spent four years of prayer and study; and here, temptations in the form of recollections of the past assailed him. To distract his mind from these he began the study of Hebrew. At Antioch the Saint received Holy Orders about the year 377, under the stipulation that he should not be obliged to serve in the ministry. After traveling in Palestine, he visited Constantinople, where St. Gregory Nazianzen was then Bishop. Again returning to Palestine, he departed for Rome, where he filled the office of secretary to Pope St. Damasus, who asked him to revise the Latin versions of Sacred Scripture then in use. After the death of St. Damasus, St. Jerome returned to the East, in 385. On his way he visited St. Epiphanius at Cyprus, and arrived at Jerusalem in the winter, leaving soon after for Alexandria to improve himself in sacred learning. Returning to Palestine, he retired to Bethlehem. His wanderings were now at an end, and his solitary life at Bethlehem began the career of study that has immortalized him.

His Scriptural works, above all, have been unparalleled in the history of the Church. Besides this branch of sacred learning, he attacked, like the other Fathers of that age, the various errors of his day. The fame of St. Jerome spread far and wide, and people came to consult him from all sides. Accompanied by Paula and Eustochium, Jerome went to Bethlehem. There he lived for thirty-four years in study, prayer, labor, and ascetcism till his death on September 30, 420. He built a monastery over which he presided and a convent headed first by Paula and after her death by Eustochium. The saint set up a hospice for the countless pilgrims to that place. His scholarship, his polemics, his treatises and letters often provoked anger and always stimulated those who read them. ‘Plato located the soul of man in the head,’ he wrote, ‘Christ located it in the heart.’ St. Jerome once said, “I interpret as I should, following the command of Christ: ‘Search the Scriptures,’ and ‘Seek and you shall find.’ For if, as Paul says, Christ is the power of God and the wisdom of God, and if the man who does not know Scripture does not know the power and wisdom of God, then ignorance of Scriptures is ignorance of Christ.” For his important scholarly contributions St. Jerome was named a Doctor of the Church. St. Jerome is the Patron Saint of  archeologists; archivists; Bible scholars; librarians; libraries; schoolchildren; students; translators. St. Jerome’s feast day is September 30th.

QUOTES OF SAINT JEROME:

☆”Ignorance of Scripture is ignorance of Christ!”
☆”Those who persevere in sin are those who are held in abhorrence by God, but those who abandon the ways of sin are loved by the Lord.”
☆“Martyrdom does not consist only in dying for one’s faith. Martyrdom also consists in serving God with love and purity of heart every day of one’s life”
☆“Thank God I am deemed worthy to be hated by the world.”
☆”Love is not to be purchased, and affection has no price.”
☆“There are things in life that are bigger than ourselves. Life is short, live it well.”
☆“Even while living in the world, the heart of Mary was so filled with motherly tenderness and compassion for men that no-one ever suffered so much for their own pains, as Mary suffered for the pains of her children.”
☆“Either we must speak as we dress, or dress as we speak. Why do we profess one thing and display another? The tongue talks of chastity, but the whole body reveals impurity.”
☆“So valuable to heaven is the dignity of the human soul that every member of the human race has a guardian angel from the moment the person begins to be.”

PRAYER BY ST. JEROME, TO INVOKE GOD’S MERCY: “Show me, O Lord, Your mercy, and delight my heart with it. Let me find You whom I so longingly seek. Behold, here is the man whom the robbers seized, manhandled, and left half dead on the road to Jericho. Kind-hearted Samaritan, come to my aid! I am the sheep who wandered into the wilderness. Seek after me and bring me home again to Your fold.  Do with me according to Your Will, that I may abide with You all the days of my life, and praise You with all those who are with You in heaven for all eternity. Amen.”🙏

PRAYER: God, You gave St. Jerome, Your priest, a great love for Holy Scripture. Let Your people feed more abundantly on Your word and find in it the source of life. Amen 🙏