OCSO Menology Month of November

Father Ambrose Conway

Fr. Ambrose Roscrea 1946 to join Nunraw

Father Ambrose Conway

Father Ambrose

John Basil Conway

born 13 March 1906

entered Roscrea in 1925

ordained Priest 1933

founder to Nunraw 1946

died 28 November 1986

Memorials

	Biography
	Community Chronicle
	Final Appreciation

 1. Biographical Details . . .

http://www.nunraw.com/sanctamaria/ambrose.htm  

OCSO

Menology

for the

Month

of November

NOVEMBER 1

Guido + c. 1145

St Bernard's eldest brother, he was already married and a man of some importance when Bernard urged him to enter the monastery with his brothers. Since his wife would not give her consent, he resolved to give up his position and lead the laborious life of a peasant. But when his wife was stricken with a grave illness, she sent for Bernard, sought pardon and agreed to let Guido enter Citeaux, while she herself became a nun. Guido died at Pontigny on his way back from founding a new monastery near Bourges.

Spinela

A nun of Arouca, Portugual.

Bernard Rosa + 1696

Abbot of Grussau in Silesia, he was one of the three prominent men who helped preserve the Catholic faith in that region.

NOVEMBER 2

Fulcard  12th century

A lay-brother of Clairvaux, a man of great purity and simplicity, he was herdsman at one of the monastery granges. Once in a dream he saw the Lord Jesus holding a goad in his gentle hand and leading the oxen at the other end of the yoke. This filled him with a great desire to see his fellow-worker in heaven. Soon afterwards he was seized with illness and seven days later his desire was happily realized. After his death, St Bernard confidently declared that he walked with God and that it was truly God who worked through him.

NOVEMBER 3

Anne Van Aelst + 1595

Her father was a Moslem convert who had been made Lord of Alost or Aelst. Anne entered Roosendael and became abbess in 1575. However, the following year her convent was pillaged and the nuns were obliged to flee. They took refuge in Malines where they lived in extreme poverty, but also in fidelity to their religious vocation.

Les Moniales, p. 101

NOVEMBER 4

Esther d'Audibert de Lussan + 1672

Named abbess of Valsauve by Pope Clement VIII in 1605, she governed the abbey for sixty-seven years and completely renewed it, exteriorly and interiorly.

Les Moniales, p. 101

NOVEMBER 5

St Malachy  1095-1148

Born and raised in Armagh, Ireland, he became the disciple of a hermit named Eimar. He was ordained at twenty-five and five years later named bishop of Connor. By his preaching and fostering the saramental life, he was instrumental in turning a heathen people back to a Christian way of life. St Celsus named him his successor as metropolitan of Armagh. However, Malachy met with much opposition, and it was not until 1134 that he could take over the diocese. Here too he restored peace and discipline and furthered the Christian life.

In 1140 he went to Rome to receive the pallium. On his way he visited Clairvaux and began a lasting friendship with St Bernard. Malachy even wished to become a Cistercian, had not the Pope forbidden it. Instead he left four of his disciples to be trained in the Cistercian life and then return to Ireland where they founded the abbey of Mellifont. On a second journey to Rome, Malachy again stopped at Clairvaux. There he became ill and on All Souls' Day he died in the arms of St Bernard and was buried at Clairvaux.

Life by St Bernard, CF 10; MBS, p. 288

 

Norbert Roelants + 1798

He was a monk and procurator of St Bernard on the Scheldt. After his monastery had been suppressed he was sentenced to deportation for refusing to take the unlawful oath. He was sent to Guiana where he lived in destitution and was soon stricken with dysentery. Offering encouragement to his brethren, Clement Van Bever, James de Mals and Edmund Eyskens, who were soon to share his fate, he died like a true martyr.

NOVEMBER 6

Rizo + 1170

The first abbot of Zinna in Brandenburg, Germany, he was slain by Lithuanians who plundered the monastery.

Siebold + 1185

The first abbot of Lebnin, also in Brandenburg, killed by Slavs.

Bl Simon  1143-1228

Born in Flanders, the son of Count de Gueldre, at sixteen he left home and all his wordly prospects in order to give himself to God. Under the guidance of his guardian angel he came to the monastery of Aulne. Here he became a lay-brother, shepherd, and later grange master. For a few years he was filled with graces and consolations, but afterwards he suffered greatly from temptations to impurity and blasphemy. When these had purified his soul he became the recipient of great graces, especially that of reading souls, which he used for the salvation and encouragement of others.

MBS, p. 292

NOVEMBER 7

Paul Lamps + 1568

A monk of Boneffe, Belgium. Heretical soldiers destroyed his monastery by fire, arrested him, tied him to a cross and fired upon him until he died.

Baldwin Fastrade + 1580

A monk of the same monastery, thrown into the River Meuse.

Clement Coppin  1828-1906

As a young man, he was a fisherman; he later enlisted in the navy. During his term of service he preserved his faith and innocence intact. When he was discharged, he went straight to the monastery of Bricquebec, where for fifty-six years he conscientiously and with great tranquillity of soul performed the duties of lay-brother, acting as porter and almsgiver.

NOVEMBER 8

Geoffrey de la Roche + 1165

A relative of St Bernard, he entered Citeaux with him, and later went to Clairvaux. St Bernard appointed him superior of Fontenay; after it was well established, he returned to Clairvaux. He replaced his abbot during the latter's absences, and did so well that Bernard referred to him as "the staff of my weakness, my eyesight and my right hand". Geoffrey later became bishop of Langres; after twenty-three years, he resigned and returned to Clairvaux where he dwelt in the same house Bernard had occupied.

Queen Berengaria  13th century

Mother of St Ferdinand and aunt of St Louis of France, she rendered excellent services to the Church, to Spain and to the Cistercian Order, and died at the convent of Las Huelgas.

Placid Luzuriaga + 1600

For thirty years an abbot of the Regular Observance in Spain, he devoted himself wholeheartedly to providing for his monks.

NOVEMBER 9

Geoffrey of Auxerre + 1190

A cleric and pupil of Abelard, he was converted by a sermon preached by St Bernard in Paris and became a monk of Clairvaux. He was Bernard's secretary, accompanied him when he preached the Crusade in Germany, gathered many of his letters into a single collection and eventually became his biographer. He was abbot successively of Igny, Clairvaux, Fossanova and Hautecombe. Pope Alexander III sent him to the East as his legate.

Nicolas  13th century

For fifty years he was a lay-brother at Villers where he tended the sheep. Many persons came to him for formation in virtue, and for years he practised the works of mercy and charity in their regard.

NOVEMBER 10

In Mecklenburg, Germany, there occurred in 1179 the martyrdom of seventy-eight monks and lay-brothers of the newly founded abbey of Doberan.

Euthymius Fourdaine + 1685

A monk of La Trappe, he was unlettered and in poor health, but gentle and guileless, sincere, simple and full of charity.

NOVEMBER 11

Henry + 1245

A canon of Bonn, Germany, he became a monk at Heisterbach and was for thirty years its abbot. Under his administration the house reached its zenith. He was consulted by bishops and civil authorities and commissioned by the Pope to preach the crusade. He was especially devoted to the Eucharist.

Alrad von Eldingen

A knight renowned for his valor, he became a lay-brother at the recently founded monastery of Isenhagen, Germany.

John Holohan  1914-1988

He was born in New Brunswick, Canada, and at the age of twenty-five entered Our Lady of the Valley. He served as novice master and prior. After the community moved to Spencer, he governed its foundation in Virginia. In December of 1957 he was named the American Definitor in Rome. A year later he was forced to return to the United States because of an illness which was eventually to confine him to a wheelchair for the rest of his life.

This confinement was a singular trial to his artist's soul, which begged to express itself, as it had earlier in the many fine water colors he produced. Yet he embraced with full acceptance this new test of his trust in the will of a loving Father and Friend. It was not a morose or melancholy acceptance; hundreds of pages of his wit and humor composed during years in a wheelchair attest to his flying spirit of joy - the joy of the freedom of the children of God. Dying unexpectedly during the night, his final trial was that in his last moments he was alone.

"My crippled body is always a burden, but my heart is always singing because it is always full of love."

NOVEMBER 12

Everard  12th century

Formerly grandmaster of the Knights Templars, he went to Clairvaux in order to pledge his fealty in a still more sacred knighthood. He was unremitting in his compunction and prayer. Once Our Lord Jesus appeared to him and told him, Your sins are forgiven."

Marie-Jean Leonard  1805-1895

He had been rector of a minor seminary, but at the age of forty, feeling God was calling him to the monastic life, he entered Senanque. He was sent to rebuild the abbey of Fontfroide, and later made vicar-general of his Congregation. During the last four years of his life he underwent a veritable martyrdom. He nevertheless thanked God for having left him a body with which to suffer and a heart with which to love.

NOVEMBER 13

All Saints of the Benedictine Family

Folquin + 1154

A cleric, he became a monk of Waldenred, Germany, and was later chosen as abbot of the new foundation of Sychem.

Abel Schier + 1879

A lay-brother of Our Lady of Grace, Bricquebec, he was exceptional for his spirit of silence, and devotion to prayer before the Blessed Sacrament.

Gabriel Sortais  1902-1963

He was a born leader, gifted with an ardent, generous spirit. In his adolescence, he had aspired to being a soldier, and then decided to study architecture. It was the example and influence of a young woman he met when he was seventeen which led him to turn seriously to God; but, on the point of becoming formally engaged to her, he realized that God was calling him to another vocation. After completing his military service, he entered Bellefontaine at the age of twenty-two.

His early years in the monastery were marked by severe trials including a serious illness and a dark night of faith. Later he would be further tried by temptations to despair and a vivid sense of having been abandoned by God. Ordained in 1931, the following year he was appointed prior, and three years later elected abbot at thirty-three.

After France declared war on Germany in September 1939, he offered his services as a military chaplain. He took part in the defense of France, was taken prisoner and for six months kept in a German prison camp where he spent himself in ministering to his fellow prisoners. After his release and return to Bellefontaine he asserted his authority against the occupying forces: "Here, I am the Fuhrer."

When after a German officer had been assassinated, fifty hostages were shot in reprisal, Dom Gabriel's intervention prevented the death of fifty more.

He was elected vicar-general at the first General Chapter after the war, and in 1951 was chosen abbot general. During the next twelve years he left his mark on the order in many ways: in aiding its world-wide expansion, in adapting the observances to the capabilities of modern monks and nuns, in encouraging studies, and in arranging for the abbesses to meet together to discuss their affairs and problems. But, above all, he strove through his visitations and circular letters to foster the union of his sons and daughters with God by a deep interior life and a generous gift of self.

Some of his writings have been collected into a volume appropriately entitled, The Things Which Please God.

NOVEMBER 14

William  12th century

A Benedictine of St Aubin at Angers, he had for many years lived as a solitary, shut up in a small cell. Hearing of the holiness of St Bernard, he became a monk of Clairvaux in order to be guided by him.

Walter of Utrecht + 1221

He came to Villers from Vaucelles and was elected abbot seven years before his death.

NOVEMBER 15

Edmunda Duguet + 1638

Subprioress at Parc aux Dames.

Benedict Michel + 1870

Abbot first of Val-Saint-Marie, and then of Grace-Dieu.

NOVEMBER 16

St Gertrude the Great 1256-1302

At the age of five she was brought to the convent of Helfta, Saxony, a house which followed Cistercian usage without being juridically attached to the Order. She received a good education and became engrossed in the liberal arts until a conversion experience when she was twenty-five, which was for her a living encounter with Christ, and the revelation of a bond of love between him and herself. She wrote of this and subsequent mystical experiences in The Herald of Divine Love, also known as her Revelations. Toward the end of her life she composed the Exercises, seven retreat experiences consisting of prayers, reflections and instructions.

Gertrude's life was not marked by any extraordinary or extravagant penances, but was simply that of the community, lived with great fervor. Her spirituality was nourished by and closely related to her liturgical life. It is marked by a very personal and familiar love for Christ, Mary and the saints. Two of its chief characteristics are confidence and abandonment. It is noteworthy that for all her deep union with God, she never completely succeeded in overcoming her character faults, and had constantly to deplore her shortcomings.

MBS, p. 295; CF 49; Peaceweavers, CS 72, p. 239

"O Love, O God, let me not be left behind in the school of charity, but in you and through you, or rather with you, let me grow to maturity day by day and advance from strength to strength, daily bringing forth fruit unto you, my Beloved, in the new path of your love."

Exercises, 98

St Edmund  1180-1240

He studied at Oxford and Pons, and after his ordination taught theology and became a poplar preacher. He was elected archbishop of Canterbury in 1233, and was adviser to the king, but when a disagreement arose between them over the rights of the Church, he was obliged to leave England. Like his predecessors, Thomas Becket and Stephen Langton, he went to Pontigny. Because of his illness, he was taken to Soissy, where he died, but his body was returned   to Pontigny for burial.

Marie Andre + 1612

She was named abbess of Beaupre-les-Grammont by King Philip in 1588. She found the convent in ruins but immediately set to work to restore it. She had the buildings repaired and enlarged the monastery property. The community began to flourish, so that at her death she left forty-seven nuns, many of them under thirty.

Les Moniales, p. 101

NOVEMBER 17

Hugh  12th century

Abbot of La Nuara, Sicily.

NOVEMBER 18

Gertrude Vedere + 1899

A first cousin of St Bernadette, she was present at the apparition of March 4, 1858, and privileged to have Our Lady look at her. When Bernadette inquired what her cousin would do, the Mother of God replied that she would enter an Order whose members wore white garments and abstained from meat. Later she did enter the Cistercian Order at Our Lady of the Seven Sorrows at Blugnac, where she lived as a true daughter of Mary, simple, upright, humble and tranquil. She served as mistress of lay-sisters and as subprioress.

NOVEMBER 19

St Mechtilde of Hackeborn  1241-1298

Of a noble family, when she was seven, her parents placed her in the convent of Rossdorf where her sister, Gertrude, was soon elected abbess. The community moved to Helfta in 1258, and the five-year old St Gertrude was placed in Mechtilde's care. They became close friends and mutually influenced and helped each other. It was Gertrude who first wrote down Mechtilde's mystical experiences in what became The Book of Special Grace, a book whose "every page is alive with color and splendid with light and sound."

Mechtilde, who possessed a beautiful voice, was for many years chantress and chant-mistress at Helfta.

MBS, p. 303; Peaceweavers, CS 72, p. 213

"What best pleases God in members of religious orders is purity of heart, holy desires, gentle kindness in conversation, and works of charity."

NOVEMBER 20

Baldwin of Ford + 1190

Little is known for certain of his early years; he was probably from Exeter. He may have studied law in Italy. In 1150 he was appointed tutor to Innocent II's nephew. In 1161, he was made archdeacon at Exeter. After the martyrdom of Thomas Becket, and perhaps influenced by it, he entered the monastery of Ford in Dorset. In 1175 he was elected abbot, and most of his Spiritual Tractates (CF 38 and 41) date from this period. They are rich in traditional Cistercian spirituality and his own insights on theology of the common life, the idea and ideal of monasticism and the stages of union with God.

His monastic years were probably the happiest and most fruitful of his life. Later he was made bishop of Worcester and archbishop of Canterbury, positions in which he was none too successful. In 1190 he went on the Crusade, and died during the siege of Acre, disillusioned and saddened by the conduct of the crusaders. In his will he left all his possessions for the relief of the Holy Land.

CS 65; NCE, vol 2, p. 28

"Take from me, O Lord, my heart of stone. Take away my hardened heart. Take away my uncircumcised heart. Give me a new heart, a heart of flesh, a pure heart! You who purify the heart, possess my heart and dwell within it, enclosing it and filling it, higher than what in me is highest, more inward than my most inward part. O form of beauty and seal of sanctity, seal my heart in your image, seal my heart under your mercy, O God of my heart, O God my portion forever."  Tractate X

NOVEMBER 21

Gelasius O'Culanan + 1580

Abbot of Boyle, he was an effective preacher and defender of the Catholic faith, for which cause he was arrested and hanged.

Anthony Gabet + 1813

Abbot of Tamie, he and his monks were forced to flee to Italy where they re-established themselves for a time. In 1800, Napoleon built a hospital for his soldiers in the Alps, and made Dom Anthony its  administrator. In this post he disposed many people to a more favorable view of the Church and the monastic life.

NOVEMBER 22

Juta Von Rustat + 1250

Foundress and first abbess of Heiligenthal, Germany.

NOVEMBER 23

Adam + 1166

A native of Cologne, he became a monk of Clairvaux under St Bernard. He was sent to the foundation of Morimond and in a few years named first abbot of Eberbach, which he governed with prudence and grace for forty years.

Jerome de la Souchiere + 1571

A native of Auvergne, a monk of Mont-Pieroux and a doctor of theology, he was elected abbot of Clairvaux in 1552. He attended the Council of Trent and made a  sincere effort to revitalize the Order according to its spirit, especially by a reform decree he issued in 1570. Pius V esteemed him highly and created him a cardinal.

Martin Ujfakvsy + 1678

Abbot of Zirc, Hungary, cruelly slain by Turks.

NOVEMBER 24

Gertrude of Hackeborn + 1292

Elder sister of St Mechtilde, she was elected abbess at the age of nineteen and ably governed the convent for forty years.

NOVEMBER 25

Walter  12th century

A canon at Liege, Belgium, he was moved by the preaching of St Bernard and became a monk of Clairvaux. He was sent to Aulne, a monastery of Canons Regular who wished to be affiliated to the Order, and became prior there.

Albert + 1216

Second abbot of Adwert, Netherlands.

NOVEMBER 26

Anne Elizabeth Gottrau  1617-1657

A pious child, she became a nun of La Maigrauge, Switzerland, where she underwent many trials which she bore with patience. She held the offices of subprioress, prioress and finally abbess, serving her sisters with gentleness and devotion.

NOVEMBER 27

William of Toulouse + 1181

A professor of some renown, he became a monk of Savigny and was shortly afterwards elected abbot. In this position he accomplished much good for the house. He resigned but was later elected a second time. The following year he was chosen abbot of Citeaux where,  two years later, he died.

NOVEMBER 28

Mechtilde of Magdeburg  c. 1209-1282

She spent most of her life as a Beguine, but in her old age she was received into the convent of Helfta where she lived in close friendship with Saints Gertrude and Mechtilde. The writings she had jotted down throughout her life, including poetry, spiritual direction of others and accounts of her own experiences, were collected into a book entitled The Flowing Light of the Godhead.

CS 72; CS 84; CS 64

"The richer she becomes, the poorer she is. The more she labors, the more sweetly she rests. The more she understands, the less she speaks. The more he gives her, the more she spends, the more she has."

NOVEMBER 29

Robert + 1190

A near kinsman of St Bernard, when he was a child his parents promised him to Cluny. Later, however, he entered Citeaux and after his profession was sent to Clairvaux. Not long afterwards, on the excuse that perhaps he was bound by his parents' promise, but no doubt because he found the regime at Clairvaux too austere, he went to Cluny. St Bernard's letter to him, reproaching him for his apostasy, is the first in his Collected Letters. Sometime later Robert heeded Bernard's admonitions and returned to Clairvaux. He was later appointed abbot of La Maison Dieu; however, he seems to have resigned after a few years.

Joanna Spirinx  16th century

Lay-sister at Beaupre, Belgium, she was noted for her piety and humility.

NOVEMBER 30

Everard  1164-1191

Founder and spiritual father of the convent of Kumbd, Germany.