Scottish Saints: Margaret, Giles, David
Special prayers during these days; for 'the General Assembly of the Church of Scotland').
Saint of the day: 24th May
Saint David of Scotland
Scotland's greatest king was the sixth and youngest son of St Margaret of Scotland and Malcolm III, born in 1085. He married Matilda daughter of Waldef, the Anglo-Saxon Earl of Northampton and Huntingd on which gave him a claim to the earldom Northumberland.
For many years he waged a long and unsuccessful war against England, but after being crowned king of Scotland in 1124, around the age of 40, he devoted his life to peaceful activities and became known as a kind, just and liberal king.
Historians say he was responsible for making Scotland into a modern nation, by reforming the legal system and public administration and encouraging trade and the foundation of towns. He also reformed the Scottish church, establishing a system of dioceses. Under his rule many monasteries, hospitals and almshouses were founded.
David prayed the Divine Office daily, received Communion each week and gave generous alms to the poor - often in person as his mother had done.
He died on this day in 1153 and was buried at Dunfermline. His shrine was a popular place of pilgrimage until the Reformation. One of the patron saints of Scotland, many churches are named after him.
Scotland's greatest king was the sixth and youngest son of St Margaret of Scotland and Malcolm III, born in 1085. He married Matilda daughter of Waldef, the Anglo-Saxon Earl of Northampton and Huntingd on which gave him a claim to the earldom Northumberland.
For many years he waged a long and unsuccessful war against England, but after being crowned king of Scotland in 1124, around the age of 40, he devoted his life to peaceful activities and became known as a kind, just and liberal king.
Historians say he was responsible for making Scotland into a modern nation, by reforming the legal system and public administration and encouraging trade and the foundation of towns. He also reformed the Scottish church, establishing a system of dioceses. Under his rule many monasteries, hospitals and almshouses were founded.
David prayed the Divine Office daily, received Communion each week and gave generous alms to the poor - often in person as his mother had done.
He died on this day in 1153 and was buried at Dunfermline. His shrine was a popular place of pilgrimage until the Reformation. One of the patron saints of Scotland, many churches are named after him.
Friday of the Seventh Week in Ordinary Time
Our Calendar today has Saint David of Scotland.
St. David was a friend of St. Aelred of Rievaux, and
it so happens that the Night Office second reading is by Aelred.
The commentary beautifully
add light to the very favoured I Corinthians’
13th chapter.
The Friday Collect of Lauds has the embrace of the
thought in prayer.
Night Office.
Friday (1)
“God of strength,
You light of hope in the heart of your Church.
Free your children from fear,
Strength them when evil threatens,
Make them more humble and more confident
On this day,
Which in your love you have prepared,
In Jesus, our Lord”.
Friday
First
Reading 1 Corintians 12:31 – 13:13
Second Reading
From
The Mirror of Charity by
Saint Aelred of Rievaulx
The Lord's yoke is
easy; the Lord's burden is light. For what can be more agreeable, what more
delightful than to find that by renouncing the world we have been raised above
it? As we stand on the lofty height of a clear conscience, we have the whole
world under our feet. When insults have no effect on us, when persecutions and
penalties have no terror for us, when prosperity or adversity has no influence
on us, when friend and foe are viewed in the same light, when we follow the example
of him who makes his sun rise on the wicked
and the good, and sends rain on the just and the unjust alike, do we
not come close to sharing the serenity of God? All such dispositions spring
from charity and charity alone, in which is true peace and contentment; for it
is the Lord's yoke, and if we follow his call to bear it our souls will find rest,
because his yoke is easy and his burden light.
Charity is patient and kind,
it is not jealous or boastful, it
is not conceited or rude. The
other virtues are to us as a carriage bearing the weary traveler, as provisions
fortifying the wayfarer, as a lamp for those in darkness, or as arms for combatants.
But charity, although it must be present in all the other virtues, is yet in a special
way rest for the weary, shelter for the traveller, fullness of light for one
who arrives, and a glorious crown for the victor.
For what is faith
but the carriage that bears us to our native land? What is hope but the food we
take for our journey through life's hardships? And those other virtues of temperance,
prudence, fortitude and justice-what are they but the weapons given us for the
struggle? But when death has been swallowed up by that perfection of charity which
is achieved in the vision of God there will be no more faith, because faith was
the preparation for that vision, and there will be no need to believe what we see
and love. And when we embrace God with the arms of our charity, there will be no
more hope, for there will be nothing left to hope for. And as for the other virtues,
temperance is our weapon against lust, prudence against error, fortitude against
adversity, justice against injustice. But in charity there is also perfect chastity,
and so no lust for temperance to combat; in charity there is the fullness of knowledge,
and so no error for prudence to guard against; in charity there is true blessedness,
and so no adversity for fortitude to overcome; in charity all is peace, and so
there is no injustice for justice to withstand.
Faith is not even
a virtue unless it is expressed by love; nor is hope unless it loves what it
hopes for. And if we look more closely, do we not see that temperance is only love
that no pleasure can seduce; that prudence is only love that no error can mislead;
that fortitude is only love courageously enduring adversity, and that justice is
only impartial love mitigating the injustices of this life? Charity therefore begins
with faith, is exercised through the other virtues, but achieves perfection in
itself.
Response 1 Jn 4:16.7
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