Community Monthly Memorial of the Dead

Community Monthly Memorial of the Dead

Wednesday, January 2013 

Month Memorial.

Fr. H. introduced the Mass for the Memorial of the recent deceased brethren, relatives and benefactors.

In the Intercessions, we remebered four monks who died in the month of January, at rest in Nunraw Cemetery. 

JANUARY

Nunraw Memorials

9^th Jan. Br. Andrew

20th Jan Br. Michael

28^th Jan Br. Bede

31^st Jan Br. Carthage

OCSO Menology

For the Month of

MENOLOGY JANUARY

JANUARY  1

Bernard + 1186           

Abbot of Fountains in England, then of Citeaux for a year and a half before his death.

Henry + 1189

Entering Clairvaux in his youth, he became abbot of Hautecombe, then of Clairvaux. He was sent by the Pope on a mission against the Albigensians, and later made a cardinal. He preached the third crusade in 1187  and gave its standard to Frederick Barbarossa and the kings of France, Philip II Augustus, and England, Richard the Lionhearted.

Ulrich + 1196

A monk of Vaucelles, he became fifth abbot of Villers. After twenty-seven years of prudent administration, he resigned and returned to Vaucelles, where he lived in holiness until his death at the age of eighty.              

 

Vincent de Paul Merle  1769-1853

A secular priest, he became a monk. In 1811, de Lestrange sent him with others to Canada in view of founding a refuge for the French monks. When in 1814 the others returned to France, through an accident, Father Vincent was left behind. He was shopping for supplies when the ship sailed without him. He became a missionary to the Indians until, in 1825, with the help of a small colony from Bellefontaine, he established Petit Clairvaux in Nova Scotia. During a cholera epidemic in Halifax, he administered the sacraments to hundreds of dying persons, and was held in high esteem by all who knew him.

Lekai, p. 184   

JANUARY  2

Louis Quinet  1595-1665

Born of peasant stock, he entered Val-Richer at the age of sixteen. Denis Largentier, recognizing his talent and piety, had him transferred to Pont-a-Mousson and later Estree. He made profession in 1615, went to Paris for studies, and obtained a doctorate in theology. He was confessor of the convent of Maubuisson, prior of Royaumont and in 1638 abbot of Barbery in Normandy, which he reformed. He belonged to a circle which included St John Eudes, Dominique Georges and Ven Mechthilde du Saint-Sacrement. He published seven or eight books of spirituality and was considered one of the most enlightened spiritual directors of his century.

Bernadine Bernard + 1867

A lay-brother from Aiguebelle, he was sent on the foundation of Les Dombes. Brother was instrumental in founding a society to carry out the words of Our Lord to St Margaret Mary, "I wish to form about my Heart a crown of twelve stars made up of my most faithful servants".

JANUARY  3

William III + 1194

Abbot of Citeaux.

Godfrey of St Maur + 1611

Feuillant monk and priest.

Dorotheus Jacob + 1716

Monk of La Trappe, converted late in life. Tepid as a novice, after his profession he was filled with gratitude for his vocation and spent the remainder of his monastic life in great fervor.

Eugene Boylan  1904-1963

Born in Derry into a family where religion, culture and music played an important part. He entered the diocesan seminary but left after two years, and studied science at University College, Dublin. After receiving his degree, he gained a scholarship which enabled him to spend two years studying in Vienna. Returning to Ireland, he lectured at his college for a few years but left in 1931 to become a monk at Roscrea.

Ordained priest in 1938, he was appointed to teach philosophy and to hear confessions in the public church. In this latter task he soon won a reputation as a spiritual director. From this experience came his first book, Difficulties in Mental Prayer which became very popular and exerted a wide influence. It was followed by several other books, notably This Tremendous Lover.

In 1953 he was sent to Australia to look for suitable property for a foundation. He acquired the site of Tarrawarra, and was appointed procurator of the new community. However, shortly afterwards he was named superior ad nutum of Caldey Abbey. In this position he was able to help the community to find its identity and a more solid economy.

When Caldey elected its own abbot, he returned to Roscrea and resumed his work of spiritual direction, writing and giving retreats within and outside the Order.

In 1962 he was elected abbot of Roscrea. Aged fifty-eight at the time, he could be expected to have  a long tenure of office, but in fact, only seventeen months later he died from injuries received in an automobile accident.

 A strong, even flamboyant personality, with a keen, incisive mind and a great capacity for sympathy with human weakness, he helped many people break away from a legalistic spirituality and come to an understanding of the love of God and of the true meaning of "partnership with Christ."

"We can truly say that Our Lord loves each of us with the same intensity, the same eager devotion to our happiness and the same intense interest in our life as if no one else existed." Partnership With Christ

"One cannot improve on the will of God as a means of sanctification, whether He sends joy or sorrow. It is His will - and that is all that really matters."  This Tremendous Lover

JANUARY  4

Roger

An Englishman, he entered Lorroy in France. He was sent as abbot to the foundation at Ellant, where he was loved for his charity and fatherly solicitude.

William Walsh + 1577

A monk of Bective, Ireland, he was made bishop of Meath. He traveled throughout Ireland encouraging the Catholics.  Captured by Protestants, he was imprisoned in an underground dungeon for seven years. His jailer, admiring his courage and constancy, connived at his escape.  He made his way to Spain and spent his last days at the Cistercian College of Alcala.

Edmond Obrecht 1852-1935

At twenty-three he entered La Grande Trappe. Immediately after his ordination in 1879, he was sent to Rome to be secretary to the procurator general of the three Trappist observances. In 1893 he was asked to go to America to collect alms on behalf of Tre Fontane. Shortly after his return to Europe, he was appointed superior of the abbey of Gethsemani; his canonical election as abbot took place less than a year later, in November 1898.

A born leader, administrator and organizer, a man of unusual tenacity of will, zealous for the Rule and for regularity, by strong measures he built Gethsemani materially and spiritually into a thriving, vital and fervent community.

JANUARY  5

Gerard + 1176 or 1177

A monk of Clairvaux under St Bernard, he became  abbot of Eberbach, Germany from 1173 to his death; a man of great integrity, purity and innocence.

JANUARY  6

 Guido

    He was a monk of Citeaux and bishop-elect of Sorsina, Italy, but was murdered before his installation.

Elizabeth Tubbac

Nun of Roosendael, Belgium.

JANUARY  7

Godfrey of Peronne

The leader of a group of nobles and scholars whom St Bernard brought back to Clairvaux from Flanders.  On their journey, he was assailed by a violent temptation, but delivered by the prayers of St Bernard. Later he was prior of Clairvaux.

John Eichhorn + 1630

Young monk of Schoenthal, Germany.

JANUARY  8

Lucia Asinara + 1655

Nun of St Anne's convent, Asti, Italy. On the day of her profession she was stricken with illness and remained bed-ridden for forty-five years.

JANUARY  9

Br. (William) Andrew McCahill (73) Nunraw Abbey

First novice to be received at the monastery of Sancta Maria Abbey, NUNRAW, 8 Dec 1946.
On Friday, 9th JANUARY  1987, Brother ANDREW died in East Fortune Hospital. He was a colourful character, intelligent, humorous, fiery, dedicated, courageously battling against ill-health for most of his adult life; first, arthritis, and then his first stroke in February, 1971. On August 31st last year he had his final stroke.

Antoinette Mezerette-Desloriers  1795-1872

               She entered St Catherine's Convent, Laval, at age thirty-three, and was sent as a foundress of La Cour-Petral, where she was subprioress, mistress of novices, and prioress.

JANUARY  10

Bl William + 1160

In 1137 he was sent from his abbey of Morimond to found Aiguebelle, and became its first abbot.

St William of Bourges + 1209

A canon of Paris, he became a monk of Grandmont.  Later he was prior successively of Pontigny, Fontaine-Jean and Chalis, then was made archbishop of Bourges.

MBS, p. 14

John of St Jerome + 1620

Feuillant monk, second vicar-general of the Congregation.

Maria de la Esperanza Roca y Roca + 1924

 She was abbess of Valdoncella, Catalonia.  Desiring to restore the primitive customs of Citeaux in her convent, she wrote new constitutions for it. When the convent was destroyed in 1909, she built a new one better accommodated to the rules of the Order.

JANUARY  11

Constance Borosa + 1500

Nun of St Clement's, Toledo.

Hilarion Mathijssen + 1921

He was a lay-brother of Westmalle.  From his youth, he had been desirous of the monastic life, but since he was obliged to support his parents, it was only at the age of forty-five that he was able to fulfill his desire. He was diligent at work, a lover of peace, with an uncommon wisdom in spiritual matters.  For the last ten years of his life he suffered from cancer of the stomach, but in spite of his pain, he maintained his gentleness, courtesy and piety.

JANUARY  12

St Aelred  1110-1167

Born in Hexham, he was educated there and in Durham. As a young man, he lived at the Scottish court. He entered Rievaulx in 1134, became novice master, then first abbot of Revesby.  In 1147 he was elected abbot of Rievaulx, which post he maintained, in spite of increasing ill-health, until his death.

His writings include The Mirror of Charity, On Spiritual Friendship, Rule for a Recluse, Jesus at the Age of Twelve, Pastoral Prayer.  His was a radiant and sympathetic personality, unique among the writers and abbots of that age. Highly gifted, strong both to do and to suffer, he was an abbot whose wisdom appeared primarily in his personal love and sympathy and his wise direction of souls.  As his disciple and biographer Walter Daniel could say:  "He who loved us all was deeply loved by us in return, and counted this the greatest of all his blessings."  His last words were, "Festinate, for crist luve."  Walter Daniel explains:  "He spoke the Lord's name in English, since he found it easier to utter, and in some way sweeter to hear in the language of his birth."

CS 2; CS 50

 "Love may truly be called the heart's own sense of taste, since it enables us to feel thy sweetness.  Love is the eye by means of which we can see that thou art good.  Love is a capacity for God who transcends all things, and whoever loves God gathers God to himself.  The more we love God, the more we possess Him, simply because God is love."  Mirror of Charity, ch. 1

Berno + 1191

Monk of Amelunxborn, Germany, made first bishop of Schwerin. Called the apostle of the Abodrites, a Slavic tribe.

Conan

Abbot of Margon, Wales.

Paul Cahill, 1814-1894

Monk of Mt Melleray, renowned as a confessor.

JANUARY  13

Yvette + 1228

Left a widow with three children after five years of marriage, she led a pious life in the world, then cared for lepers for ten years, and finally was enclosed as a recluse adjoining the monastery of Villers, where she spent the remaining thirty-six years of her life. Her father became a monk of Villers, her elder son abbot of Orval, her younger son a monk of Trois-Fontaines.

Peace Weavers, CS 72, p. 138 

Ida + 1226

Raised in the Benedictine convent of St Leonard at Liege, she became a Cistercian nun at Val-Notre-Dame, and was later made abbess of Argensolles in Champagne.

JANUARY  14

Amadeus the Elder + 1150

After his wife's death, he entered Bonnevaux with sixteen companions and his only son, Amadeus (August 30). A year later he took his son to Cluny, but afterwards returned to Bonnevaux and did penance for his infidelity.

MBS, p. 9;  Simplicity and Ordinariness, CS 61,  p.14 

Luppert von Boderike + 1330

Abbot of Marienfeld, Westphalia, for thirty-seven years.

JANUARY  15

Placid of St Maur Bernarducci + 1610

Monk of Les Feuillants.

Augustin Onfroy + 1857

 A priest and a pastor, he became a novice at Grosbois. Compelled to leave during the Napoleonic persecution, he later, at his bishop's suggestion, founded a new monastery, Our Lady of Grace, Bricquebec, where he was abbot.

JANUARY  16

Bernardine Juif + 1836

               A monk of Lutzel, he was driven from his country at the end of the 18th century, but returned in disguise to minister to the faithful.  Later he joined Oelenberg, but again in 1830 he was compelled to leave the cloister and once again became a pastor of souls.

Eusebius Manuel + 1846

Novice at Aiguebelle. He made his vows on his death bed.

JANUARY  17

William of St Alexius Gallet  1556-1623

               The first monk to receive the habit of the Feuillant Congregation, assistant to Dom Jean de la Barriere; a monk with a great spirit of simplicity, humility and prayer.

Elizabeth Castella de Gruyere  1578-1611

Nun of La Maigrauge, with a special zeal for silence.

Mary Anne Elizabeth von Gottrau + 1919

A novice at La Maigrauge, especially devoted to the Sacred Heart and desirous of making reparation, she became gravely ill and made her vows on her death bed.

JANUARY  18

William of Champeaux + 1122

Bishop of Chalons-sur-Marne, he gave St Bernard the abbatial blessing. Clairvaux's first foundation, Trois-Fontaines, was made in his diocese.

Amandus Levecque  1765-1848

A Benedictine, he became a Cistercian at Darfeld.  De Lestrange entrusted him with various offices;  eventually he became a monk of Port du Salut.

JANUARY  19

Anne d'Orvire De la Vieuville + 1618

Abbess of Leyme. She reformed her house despite opposition from the nuns and outsiders, encouraged and counselled by de Rance.

Les Moniales, p. 109

JANUARY  20

Brother Michael Peter McGinlay (90) Nunraw Abbey 29 June 1906 - 20 JANUARY  1996, was born in Dumbarton on June 1906. His father was a journeyman riveter and after secondary school at St Patrick's, Peter followed him into the Clydeside shipyards and became a master joiner. During the war he served as a leading fireman. He was active in the parish as a pass-keeper and in the work of the Knights of St. Columba. He was later very proud to receive his Golden Jubilee medal from the Knights.
In 1954 he felt the call to the religious life and came to Nunraw at the advanced aged of forty-eight. It was a happy calling for one who wished to offer his considerable manual skills and he found fulfilment in collaborating in the building of the new Abbey. He was professed as a monk on 19 May 1957.
To his vocation of prayer and religious life he brought all the methodical and persevering application which. distinguished him to the end. Even in the last weeks he declined to go to hospital, stating very clearly that he wished to die in his monastery, where he died peacefully on Saturday 20 JANUARY , aged 89

Daniel of Grammont + 1196

Monk of Clairvaux, sent by St Bernard to Cambrai in Hainaut, Belgium, where he became its third abbot.

Anne Louise de Crevant d'Humieres + 1710

Abbess and reformer of Mouchy in France.

Catherine Castella + 1770

Mistress of novices at La Maigrauge.

Bl Cyprian Tansi  1903-1964

He was born in Nigeria of pagan parents. They sent him to a Christian school at the age of eight, and two years later he was baptized receiving the name of Michael. The piety and austerity which were to characterize his whole life began early.

At sixteen he became a school teacher, and in five years a headmaster. Desiring to dedicate himself more fully to God, he began studies for the priesthood at the age of twenty-two. He was one of the first Nigerians to be ordained. As a priest he served in four vast parishes. His priestly life was characterized by great zeal, firmness almost to the point of rigidity, but balanced by great kindness especially to the poor, the sick and to women whose champion he became. He was much loved and revered by the people he served.

For a long time he felt an attraction to a life of deeper prayer and self-surrender. In 1950 his bishop arranged for him to enter Mt St Bernard. Here he was given the name of Cyprian. In his monastic life he manifested a scrupulous fidelity to the Rule, great docility, self-effacement, and patience in his growing physical infirmities and interior trials.

Abandonment to God's will, complete and utter detachment, and an uncompromising dedication to what he considered was required by the Catholic faith, were the chief characteristics of his spirituality. He was beatified by Pope John Paul II in 1998.

Entirely For God, CS 43

"If you are going to be a Christian at all, you might as well live entirely for God."

JANUARY  21

Pachomius de Marville + 1792

Priest of the diocese of Laon, he joined the monks of La Trappe who were fleeing to La Val Sainte.

JANUARY  22

 Walter of Bierbeek + 1206

Monk and guestmaster of Himmerod, greatly devoted to Our Lady.

MBS, p. 22

JANUARY  23

A commemoration of the monks of Engelszell, Austria, who perished at Dachau in 1940.

Thomas Merton, The Waters of Siloe, p. 219

JANUARY  24

Blessed Felix O'Dulany + 1202

In his youth he became a Cistercian either at Mellifont or Baltinglass Abbey.  Having excelled in regularity and ability, he was sent as superior of the foundation at Jerpoint, which prospered so well that in six years it was able to found a daughter house at Kilkenny. In 1178 he became bishop of Ossory, a territory ravaged by invasion. He governed the diocese wisely, fostering peace between the Celts and the Normans.

MBS, p. 24

Angela Norton  1911-1986

Born and raised in New York. At twenty-seven she entered the Dominicans in Sparkill, New York, and in 1947 transferred to the abbey of Bon Conseil in Canada. In 1949 she returned to the USA when Mt St Mary's Abbey was founded in Wrentham. Appointed superior in May 1952, three years later she was elected abbess. She guided her community with wisdom and love for thirty-three years, and founded two houses, one in Iowa, the other in Arizona, and initiated a third in Virginia.

JANUARY  25

Paul Piroulle + 1711

Abbot and restorer of the monastery of Val-Dieu in Belgium, he combined gentleness with great fortitude.

Caroline Castella de Gruyere + 1829

Cellarer of La Fille Dieu, she served the community with humility and was able to bring the convent out of its state of extreme poverty.  She was elected abbess eight months before her death.

JANUARY  26

 Solemnity of our Holy Founders Saints Robert, Alberic and Stephen.

See April 29 for St Robert of Molesme, and March 28 for St Stephen Harding.

St Alberic  c. 1040-1109

Nothing is known of his origins or early life. According to the Exordium Parvum he was "a man of letters, well versed in divine and human science." He became a disciple of St Robert, first at Colan and later at Molesme, where he was prior. He was a prime mover in the desire for reform which led to the foundation of Citeaux. There he was again prior, and shortly after Robert's return to Molesme, was elected second abbot.

It fell to Alberic to effect the consolidation of the New Monastery, both materially and morally. One of his first moves was to obtain a bull of papal protection for Citeaux from Pope Paschal II. Finding the original site unsuitable, he moved the location of the monastery a short distance away, and saw to the construction of the permanent buildings. He was probably responsible for the first "Institutes" of Citeaux. He died after ten years in office. Evidently a man of ability and firm character, no higher estimate of his worth could be given than the succinct and pregnant characterization of the Exordium Parvum: "a lover of the Rule and of the brethren."

Exordium Parvum; MBS, pp. 26, 126, 204; Father Raymond, Three Religious Rebels;  The Cistercian Spirit, especially pp. 1 and 88;  Lekai, p. 11

Haseka + 1261

Recluse near the monastery of Sittichenbach.

Eustace of St Paul + 1640

Feuillant, prior of San Bernardo alle Terme, in Rome.

Peter Emberger + 1924

Monk of Schlierbach in Austria.

JANUARY  27

Antonia Alvarez + 1717

Nun of San Quirce, Valladolid. Favored with bilocution, she gave instruction in the faith to Mohammedans in Africa and Indians in America.

Ursus Schute + 1718

Monk of Wettingen in Switzerland.

JANUARY  28

Br Bede (John) Daley, Nunraw Abbey (76) 27 November 1912 - 27 JANUARY  1989 was born at Houghton-le-Spring, Co. Durham, 27th November 1912. His parents, John and Susan, had four sons and three daughters. He is survived by brothers Felix, Michael, and Anthony. John was a foreman baker. Active in Catholic life, his vocation to become a monk grew from a sense of dedication. He took part in the national Cross Pilgrimages to Walsingham in 1949. His reading of Thomas Merton, ‘Elected Silence’ drew him to the Cistercians and Nunraw. Before he entered Nunraw in 1950, he went to Fatima and experienced the faith and devotion to Our Lady in a way that was to remain with him. Cheerful and adaptable he joined the growing community of Nunraw and made his final profession in March 1956.

Margaret Antoinette Piquet + 1674

Nun of St Bernard's Convent, Vienne.

JANUARY  29

A number of monks and lay-brothers of Goldenkron, Koenigssaal, Kamenz, Heinrichau, Luba, Neuzell, Altzell, Zwettl and Walderbach were put to death by Hussites between 1420 and 1432.

JANUARY  30

Ignatius, Nivard and Linus Loeb

Blood brothers, Jewish converts, monks of Koeningshoeven, and their sisters, Hedwig and Theresa, nuns of Berkel, were arrested in 1942 by the Nazis, deported to Poland and killed.

Thomas Merton, The Waters of Siloe, p. 224

JANUARY  31

Br (Thomas) Carthage Brosnan (65) 9 September 1913- 31 JANUARY  1979, was born on 9th September 1913 in Faranfore, Co. Kerry. He was educated at Mount Melleray College and entered the Abbey of Mt. St Joseph on the 12th October 1934, taking the name of Br. Carthage. Here he made his Simple Profession on the 2nd May 1937 and Solemn Profession 2nd May 1940. He fulfilled the usual duties of a novice and young monk and was community cook for some time. He was one of the founders to establish Nunraw in 1946. He was farm manager there from 1970 and died suddenly 31 Jan 1979.

Peter

Lay-brother of Villers.

Maria of the Mother of God  16th century

Nun of St Mary Magdalen's Convent, Yepes in Spain; foundress and abbess of the convent of the Most Pure Conception in the valley of Pinto.