Sunday, July 13, 2008

Bl Pier Giorgio Frassati, Man of the Beatitudes

Once I get to Sydney, I intend to visit the tomb and shrine of Bl Mary MacKillop, and also venerate the sacred relics of Bl Pier Giorgio, temporarily translated from Turin to St Mary's Cathedral.

It is a marvellous privilege and a Godgiven blessing to come before the sacred relics of the saints: for, as the Scriptures testify, God is pleased to shew His goodpleasure with those who have lived godly and righteous lives, by approving the veneration of their bodies (which were baptised in the Name of the Trinity, temples of His Holy Spirit, one day to be raised up and glorified in the image of Christ, manifested as children of God) and by working miracles through their instrumentality - as when mere contact with the bones of St Eliseus raised a dead man to life (cf. IV (II) Kings xiii, 21; Ecclus xlviii, 14-15), as when the shadow of the living Apostle Peter (cf. Acts v,15) or handkerchiefs that had been touched by the Apostle Paul (cf. Acts xix, 12) cured the sick.

Bl Pier Giorgio is one toward whom I have some devotion, and I am sorry to have missed posting something on his feast day, the 4th of July - an unavoidable problem when one uses the '62 Breviary only!

To say something about him, I must rely on that excellent and devout bishop, His Lordship Anthony Fisher, O.P., who somehow found time in the midst of over a year of hectic preparation to preach a strong sermon on Bl Pier Giorgio at the Dominican church in Sydney on his feast day, in presence of his relics; here is a devotion of mine in his honour, he who is styled "the Man of the Beatitudes", after the words of Cardinal Wojtyla in 1977: “Behold the man of the eight beatitudes who bears in himself the grace of the Gospel, the Good News, the joy of salvation offered to us by Christ.” As the Blessed used to say, “verso l’alto” (toward the top)!

ORATIO AD B. PETRO GEORGIO

Aña. Benedictus Deus, qui elegit nos, ut essemus sancti et immaculati in caritate. (Eph 1:3,4)

Canticum: Beatitudines (Mt 5:3-10)

Beati pauperes spiritu: * quoniam ipsorum est regnum cælorum.
Beati mites: * quoniam ipsi possidebunt terram.
Beati qui lugent: * quoniam ipsi consolabuntur.
Beati qui esuriunt et sitiunt justitiam: * quoniam ipsi saturabuntur.
Beai misericordes: * quoniam ipsi misericordiam consequentur.
Beati mundo corde: * quoniam ipsi Deum videbunt.
Beati pacifici: * quoniam filii Dei vocabuntur.
Beati qui persecutionem patiuntur propter justitiam: * quoniam ipsorum est regnum cælorum.
Gloria Patri…


Aña. Benedictus Deus, qui elegit nos, ut essemus sancti et immaculati in caritate.

V/. Viam mandatorum tuorum cucurri.
R/. Cum dilatasti cor meum. (Ps 118(119):32)

Oremus.

Deus, qui beato juveni Petro Georgio gratiam largitus es Christum reperiendi in fide et caritate cum gaudio; praesta quæsumus ut, eo intercedente, et nos evangelicarum Beatitudinem spiritum inter homines hodierni temporis diffundere valeamus. Per...

(O God, Who didst give grace to the blessed youth Pier Giorgio to find Christ in faith and charity with joy; grant, we beseech Thee, that, he interceding, we also may have the strength to propagate the spirit of the evangelical Beatitudes among the men of the present time. Through…)

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