Tea at Trianon: Surrounded by a Cloud of Witnesses

John Wilson Croker on Marie-Antoinette

"We have followed the history of Marie Antoinette with the greatest diligence and scrupulosity. We have lived in those times. We have talked with some of her friends and some of her enemies; we have read, certainly not all, but hundreds of the libels written against her; and we have, in short, examined her life with– if we may be allowed to say so of ourselves– something of the accuracy of contemporaries, the diligence of inquirers, and the impartiality of historians, all combined; and we feel it our duty to declare, in as a solemn a manner as literature admits of, our well-matured opinion that every reproach against the morals of the queen was a gross calumny– that she was, as we have said, one of the purest of human beings."

~from History of the Guillotine by John Wilson Croker, 1844

Edmund Burke on Marie-Antoinette

"It is now sixteen or seventeen years since I saw the queen of France, then dauphiness, at Versailles; and surely there never lighted on this orb, which she hardly seemed to touch, a more delightful vision. I saw her just above the horizon, decorating and cheering the elevated sphere she had just begun to move in, glittering like a morning star full of life and splendor and joy. Oh, what a revolution....Little did I dream that I should have lived to see such disasters fall upon her, in a nation of gallant men, in a nation of men of honor and of cavaliers! I thought ten thousand swords must have leaped from their scabbards, to avenge even a look which threatened her with insult. But the age of chivalry is gone; that of sophisters, economists, and calculators has succeeded...."

~Edmund Burke, October 1790

Tuesday, August 23, 2022

Surrounded by a Cloud of Witnesses

From Catholic Exchange:

I led a bus pilgrimage for my parishioners to St. Louis and Chicago. One of our stops in Chicago was the Basilica of Seven Sorrows. It’s a parish run by the Servite order. In the sanctuary, there was a painting on the wall of a woman religious on a bed, with a priest bent over her and administering the sacraments, while servers and other sisters looked on. Not knowing who the nun was, I asked the priest who was giving our tour. He told us the story of St. Juliana who at her death had a desire to receive the Eucharist. Due to her illness, she was not able to but her Eucharistic faith prompted her to ask the priest to open the corporal on her chest and to place the host on it. The host disappeared and quickly thereafter Juliana died. Upon her death and examination of her body, a cross was found on her chest; the same cross imprinted on the Holy Eucharist. In a miraculous manner she received her last Holy Communion.

The stories of the saints are meant to inspire us. For St. Imelda, St. Raymond, and St. Juliana, each had a burning desire to receive the Holy Eucharist. Their desire should inspire us with the same desire and fervor. Every Sunday you should desire to receive the Holy Eucharist, and if that desire isn’t there, ask them to help you to desire it, because with every Holy Communion, the Lord Jesus makes His home within you. As we learn their stories, we can begin asking these saints to intercede for us and our Eucharistic devotion. Surrounded by a cloud of witnesses who loved the Holy Eucharist, may they help to deepen our faith, belief, and devotion to Jesus present body, blood, soul, and divinity in the Eucharist received in Holy Communion, reposed in the tabernacle, and adored on the altar. (Read more.)