August 24 — Saint Bartholomew Apostle

A witness of the Son of God, one of the princes who announced His glory to the nations, lights up this day with his apostolic flame. While his brethren of the sacred college followed the human race into all the lands whither the migration of nations had led it, Bartholomew appeared as the herald of the Lord at the very starting point, the mountains of Armenia, whence the sons of Noe spread over the earth. There had the figurative Ark rested ; humanity, everywhere else a wanderer, was there seated in stillness, remembering the dove with its olive branch, and awaiting the consummation of the alliance signified by the rainbow which had there for the first time glittered in the clouds. Behold, blessed tidings awake in those valleys the echoes of ancient traditions: tidings of peace, making the universal deluge of sin subside before the Wood of salvation. The serenity announced by the dove of old, was now far outdone. Love was to take the place of punishment. The ambassador of heaven showed God to the sons of Adam, as the most beautiful of their own brethren. The noble heights whence formerly flowed the rivers of paradise, were about to see the renewal of the covenant annulled in Eden^nd the celebration, amid the joy of heaven and earth, of the divine nuptials so long expected, the union of the Word with regenerated humanity.

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TIME AFTER PENTECOST

Personally, what was this apostle whose ministry borrowed such solemnity from the soene of his apostolio labours? Under the name or surname of Bartholomew, 1 the only mark of recognition given him by the first three Gospels, are we to see, as many have thought, that Nathaniel, whose presentation to Jesus by rhilip forms so sweet a scene in St. J ohn's Gospel ? 2 A man full of uprightness, innocence, and simplicity, who was worthy to have had the dove for his precursor, and for whom the Man-God had choice graces and caresses from the very beginning.

Be this as it may, the lot which fell to our saint among the twelve, points to the special confidence of the divine Heart ; the heroism of the terrible martyrdom whioh sealed his apostolate reveals his fidelity ; the dignity preserved by the nation he grafted on Christ, in all the countries where it has been transplanted, witnesses to the excellence of the sap first infused into its branches. When, two centuries and cultivated the soil of Armenia, he did but quicken the seed sown by the apostle, which the trials never wanting to that generous land had retarded for a time, but could not stifle.

How strangely sad, that evil men, nurtured in the turmoil of endless invasions, should have been able to rouse and perpetuate a mistrust of Borne among a race whom wars and tortures and dispersion oould not tear from the love of Christ our Saviour ! Yet, thanks be to God! the movement towards return, more than once begun and then abandoned, seems now to be steadily advancing ; the chosen sons of this illustrious nation are labouring perseveringly for so desirable a union, by dispelling the prejudices of her people ; by revealing to our lands the treasures of

1 Son of Tholmai. > St. John i. 45-51. a half later, Gre| the Illuminator so successfully

SAINT BARTHOLOMEW her literature so truly Christian, and the magnifioenoes of her liturgy ; and above all by praying and devoting themselves to the monastic state under the standard of the father of western monks. 1 Together with these holders of the true national tradition, let us pray to Bartholomew their apostle ; to the disciple Thaddeus 2 who also shared in the first evangelisation; to Bipsima the heroic virgin, who from the Roman territory led her thirty-five companions to the conquest of a new land ; and to all the martyrs whose blood cemented the building upon the only foundation set by our Lord. Like these great forerunners, may the leader of the seoond apostolate, Gregory the Illuminator, who wished to 4 see Peter* in the person of St. Sylvester and receive the blessing of the Eoman Pontiff, may the holy kings the patriarchs and doctors of Armenia, become once more her chosen guides, and lead her back entirely and irrevocably to the one fold of the one Shepherd !

We learn from Eusebius 3 and from St. Jerome, 4 that before going to Armenia, his final destination, St. Bartholomew evangelized the Indies, where Pantaenus a century later found a copy of St. Matthew's Gospel in Hebrew characters, left there by him. St. Denis records a profound saying of the glorious apostle, which he thus quotes and comments: * The blessed Bartholomew says of theology, that it is at once abundant and succinot ; of the Gospel, that it is vast in extent and at the same time concise ; thus excellently giving us to understand that the beneficent Cause of all beings reveals or manifests Himself by many words or by few, or even without any words at all, as being beyond and above all language or thought. For He is above all by His superior essence ; i Mekhitarists, Armenian monks of St. Benedict. * One of the seventy-two. 1 Hitt. Eccl. lib. v. e. 1.

• J)e Script. JEccl. c. xxxvi.

TIMB AFTER PBNTBC08T and they alone reach Him in His truth, without ti^e yeils wherewith He surrounds Himself, who, passing beyond matter and spirit, and rising above the summit of the holiest heights, leave behind them all reflexions and eohoes of God, all the language of heaven, to enter into the darkness wherein He dwelleth, as the Soripture says, who is above all/ 1

The eity of Borne celebrates the feast of St. Bartholomew to-morrow, as do also the Greeks who commemorate on August 25 a translation of the apostle's relics. It is owing, in fact, to the various translations of his holy body and to the difficulty of ascertaining the date of his martyrdom that different days have been adopted for his feast by different Churohes, both in the east and in the west. The twenty- fourth of this month, consecrated by the use of most of the Latin Churches, is the day assigned in the most ancient martyrologies, including that of St. Jerome. In the thirteenth century Innooent HI, having been consulted as to the divergence, answered that local custom was to be observed. 2

The Churoh gives us the following notice of the apostle of Armenia.

Bartholomseus apostolus, Galilaeus, cum in Indiam eiteriorem, quae ei in orbis terrarum sortitione ad praedicandum J esu Christi E vangelium obvenerat, progressus esset, adventum Domini Jesu juxta sancti Matthaei Evangelium illis gentibus praBdicavit. Sed cum in ea provincia plurimos ad Je-

The apostle Bartholomew was a native of Galilee. It fell to his lot to preach the Gospel in hither India; and he announced to those nations the coming of our Lord Jesus Christ according to the Gospel of St. Matthew. But after converting many souls to Jesus Christ in that province and undergoing much labour and

1 Dion. De mystica theolog. c. i. § . 3. * Decretal, lib. iii. tit. xlvi, c. 2. Consilium.

SAINT BARTHOLOMEW sum Christum convertisset, multos labores calaraitatesque perpessus, venit in majorem Armeniam.

Ibi Polymium regem et conjugem ejus, ac praeterea duodecim civitates ad Christianamfidemperduxit. Quae res in eum magnam invidiam concitavit illius gentis sacerdotum. Nam usque adeo Astyagem Polymii regis fratrem in apostolum incenderunt, ut is vivo Bartholomseo pellem crudeliter detrahi jusserit, ac caput abscindi: quo in martyrio animam Deo reddidit.

Ejus corpus Albani, quae est urbs majoris Armeniae, ubi is passus fuerat, sepultum est: quod postea ad Liparam insulam delatum, inde Beneventum translatum est: postremo Romam ab Othone tertio imperatore portatum, in Tiberis insula, in ecclesia ejus nomine Deo dicata, collocatum f uit. Agitur autem Romae dies festus octavo Kalendas Septembris, et per octo consequentes dies ilia basilica magna populi frequentia celebratur. suffering, he went into eastern Armenia.

Here he converted to the Christian faith the king Polymius and his queen and twelve cities. This caused the pagan priests of that nation to be exceedingly jealous of him, and they stirred up Astyages the brother of king Polymius against the apostle, so that he commanded him to be flayed alive and finally beheaded. In this cruel martyrdom he gave up his soul to God.

His body was buried at Albanapolis, the town of eastern Armenia where he was martyred; but it was afterwards taken to the island of Lispari, and thence to Beneventum. Finally it was translated to Rome by the emperor Otho III and placed on the island of the Tiber in a church dedicated to God under his invocation. His feast is kept at Rome on the eighth of the Kalends of September, and during the eight following days that basilica is much frequented by the faithful.

On this day of thy feast, 0 holy apostle, the Church prays for grace to love what thou didst believe and to preach what thou didst teach. 1 Not that the bride of the Son of God could ever fail either in faith or in love ; but she knows only too well that,

1 Collect of the day.

TIME AFTER PENTECOST though her Head is ever in the light, and her heart ever united to the Spouse in the holy Spirit who sanctifies her, nevertheless her several members, the particular churches of which she is composed, may detach themselves from their centre of life and wander away in darkness. 0 thou who didst choose our west as the place of thy rest ; thou whose precious relics Rome glories in possessing, bring back to Peter the nations thou didst evangelize; fulfil the now reviving hopes of universal union ; second the efforts made by the vicar of the Man-God to gather again under the shepherd's crook those scattered flocks whose pastures have become parohed by schism. May thine own Armenia be the first to complete a return whioh she began long ago ; may she trust the mother- Church and no more follow the sowers of disoord. All being reunited, may we together enjoy the treasures of our concordant traditions, and go to God, even at the cost of being despoiled of all things, by the oourse so grand and yet so simple taught us by thy example and by thy sublime theology.

August 25

ST. LOUIS, KING OF FRANCE

CONFESSOR

It was his Christian faith that made Louis IX so great a prince. 4 You that are the judges of the earth, think of the Lord in goodness, and seek Him in simplicity of heart.' 1 Eternal Wisdom, in giving this preoept to kings, rejoiced with divine foreknowledge among the lilies of France, where this great saint was to shine with so bright a lustre.

Subject and prince are bound to God by a common law, for all men have one entrance into life, and the like going out.' Far from being less responsible to the divine authority than his subjects, the prince is answerable for every one of them as well as for himself. The aim and object of creation is that God be glorified by the return of all oreatures to their Author, in the manner and measure that He wills. Therefore, since God has called man to a participation in His own divine life, and has made the earth to be to him but a plaoe of passage, mere natural justioe and the present order of things are not sufficient for him. Kings must reoognize that the object of their civil sovereignty, not being the last end of all things, is, like themselves, under the direction and absolute rule of that higher end, before which they are but as subjects. Hear therefore, ye kings, and understand: a greater punishment is ready for the more mighty. 3

^isd. i. 1. mid. vii. 6. 8 Ibid. vi. 2 ? 9,

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TIME AFTER PENTECOST

Thus did the divine goodness give merciful warnings under the ancient Covenant.

But not satisfied with riving repeated admonitions, Wisdom came down from her heavenly throne. Henceforth the world belongs to her by a twofold title. By the right of her divine origin, she held the principality in the brightness of the saints, before the rising of the day star ; she now reigns by right of conquest over the redeemed world. Before her coming in the flesh, it was already from her that kings received their power, and that eauity which direots its exercise. Jesus, the Son of Man, whose Blood paid the ransom of the world, is now, by the contraot of the sacred nuptials which united Him to our nature, the only source of power and of all true justioe. And now, once more, 0 ye kings, understand: says the psalmist; receive instruction, you that judge the earth. 1

'It is Christ who speaks:' says St. Augustine. 4 Now that I am king in the name of God My Father, be not sad, as though you were thereby deprived of some good you possessed ; but rather acknowledging that it is good for you to be subject to Him who gives you security in the light, serve this Lord of all with fear, and rejoice unto Him.' 2

It is the Church that continues, in the name of our ascended Lord, to give to kings this security which oomes from the light: the Church who, without trespassing upon the authority of princes, is nevertheless their superior as mother of nations, as judge of consciences, as the only guide of the human raoe journeying towards its last end. Let us listen to the sovereign Pontiff Leo XIII, speaking with the precision and power which characterize his infallible teaohing: ' As there are on earth two great sooieties: 1 Psalm ii. 10. 1 S. Aug. Enarrat, in Ps. ii t