The Gregorian Society of Baltimore

09/09/2026

He called himself, "The slave of the slaves."

September 9th, Feast of Saint Peter Claver, Jesuit Missionary, (1580-1654)

If anyone wonders what exactly it is that constitutes a Saint, he has only to read the life of Saint Peter Claver, in whom the superhuman life of grace acted so visibly as to create a person who seemed more than a man. This holy Jesuit, born in Spain in 1580, was during his novitiate a disciple of Saint Alphonsus Rodriguez, the holy porter of Majorca, a humble lay-brother endowed with the highest gifts of contemplation and prophecy. The two would eventually be canonized together by Pope Leo XIII in 1888, thus cementing the perfect union which began on earth and certainly continues in heaven. Saint Alphonsus, when he saw the novice for the first time, was inspired to kiss his feet; and the novice embraced his spiritual father with a tenderness which would increase with time. A little later, the preceptor learned from a vision that this novice was destined to save a multitude of souls in the New World; he said to Saint Peter: “How many peoples go astray for lack of ministers! The fatigue of going to seek them out is dreaded, but not the danger and crime which it is to abandon them!” Eventually Saint Alphonsus revealed his divinely revealed calling to him, to inspire in him an active desire to respond to the explicit Will of God.

After eight years of study and apostolic preparation in Spain, Saint Peter asked to go to the Jesuit missions of the Western Indies, and was sent to Carthagena in Colombia, South America, when he was thirty years old. He was assigned to accompany an elderly priest who had undertaken a ministry of service to the poor Africans brought to be sold in the market of that city. These poor strangers spoke several languages but shared a common misery, which Saint Peter soon saw clearly. When the holds of the boats were opened, all one beheld was a confused mass of men, women, children and old men, sick persons mingled with healthy ones, and often, alas!, living beings next to cadavers, for the crossing made victims. The elderly forerunner of Saint Peter, when about to retire, asked that the objects of his care be definitively confided to Saint Peter Claver, a petition willingly granted.

Thus began forty-four years of unceasing dedication to their spiritual and material betterment by Saint Peter. He watched for the arrival of the slave ships, which brought from ten to twelve thousand souls each year, and never failed to be the first to go aboard, accompanied by his interpreters and carrying the provisions he had been able to beg. He greeted the living, arranged for the burial of the dead and the transport of the sick to hospitals. Having won their sympathy, he went to them regularly with his interpreters and taught them, during several hours' time, the elements of doctrine, aided by pictures. Before he died, he had baptized 400,000. He put around the necks of each newly baptized child of God, a medal which would thereafter distinguish the Christians from the yet untaught.

Though this was his principal industry, he also spent many days in the nearby lazaretto — a refuge for lepers — and in the hospitals of the region. No infirmity repelled him; the Brother who accompanied him had several times a day to clean his cloak, on which he would lay the sick while he arranged their poor beds. It never ceased to emit a heavenly fragrance. He slept only two or three hours at night, and ate almost nothing. The poor were his beloved children and he their beloved father, whose visits were anxiously awaited and were always too short. Those who resisted him did not do so indefinitely; one man insulted him for twenty-two years, but at the end of that time fell on his knees and begged his pardon. The vision of his charity is certainly reserved for heaven; his biographers scarcely find words adequate to describe his heroic life. Pope Pius IX, who beatified Saint Peter in 1851, commented that never had he read a life of a Saint which so moved him.

After Saint Peter contracted the plague in his declining years, he was left infirm and partially paralyzed. He then had himself tied to a donkey and in that way went about begging and distributing provisions. He had a rude servant who often neglected him and mistreated him, but when his brethren offered him another, asked to be allowed to keep that one, who treated him far better than he deserved. Two years after his death at the age of seventy-four, his body was found intact, despite the humidity of the burial site and the live caustic covering it. Miracles proliferated there and elsewhere by the invocation of his name. A large church was built in Carthagena in his honor, and he became the second patron of his adopted land, Colombia.

Vie abrégée de Saint Pierre Claver, Jésuite, l'Apôtre de Carthagène, by a priest of the diocese of Montreal, 1925

The painting is by Emanuel Dite,(1894).

09/09/2026

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“Happy Birthday Mary, Queen of Victories!” - President Donald J. Trump

09/08/2026

“O Mary conceived without sin, pray for us who have recourse to Thee!”

September 8th, Feast of the Nativity of the Blessed Virgin, (ca. 15 B.C.)

The birth of the Blessed Virgin Mary announced joy and the approaching salvation of a lost world. Mary was brought into the world not like other children of Adam, infected with the contagion of sin, but pure, holy, beautiful, and glorious, adorned with all the most precious graces fitting for the One predestined to be the Mother of the Saviour.

Never did She have the slightest inclination towards anything other than the absolute and immediate Will of God. She appeared indeed in the weak condition of all mortals, but in the eyes of Heaven She already transcended the highest seraphim in purity, humility, charity, and the richest ornaments of grace. God had created Her in the original grace, as in the beginning Adam and Eve had enjoyed that ineffable privilege; after original sin, it was lost for all Adam's posterity, until the time of the Redemption dawned in Mary. (Cf. I Cor. 15:21-23)

The nations celebrate, often too noisily, the birthdays of the great ones of this earth. How then ought we, Christians, to rejoice in that of the Virgin Mary, Mother of our Salvation, and to present publicly to God the homage of our best praises and thanksgiving for the great mercies He has shown in Her, imploring Her mediation with Her Divine Son!

Jesus of Nazareth will not reject the supplications of His most holy Mother, through whom He chose to descend from Heaven; She, the Spouse of the Canticle, is all beautiful and is the One He was pleased to obey while on earth. Her love, care, and tenderness for Him, the title and qualities which She bears, the charity and graces with which She is adorned, and the crown of glory with which She is honored, incline Him readily to receive Her recommendations and petitions.

Reflection: The Angelical Salutation is the prayer which most pleases Mary; but when time is short we can invoke Her constantly by short ejaculatory prayers, such as the one She entrusted to Catherine Labouré in 1830 with the Miraculous Medal: “O Mary conceived without sin, pray for us who have recourse to Thee!” or, shorter yet: “My Mother, my confidence!”

Little Pictorial Lives of the Saints, a compilation based on Butler's Lives of the Saints and other sources by John Gilmary Shea (Benziger Brothers: New York, 1894).

09/08/2026

September 8th, Feast of the Nativity of the Blessed Virgin Mary.

“Blessed and venerable art thou, O Virgin Mary, who without any violation of purity, wast found the Mother of our Savior. O Virgin Mother of God, He Whom the whole world cannot contain, enclosed Himself in thy womb, becoming man. Alleluia, alleluia. Happy art thou, O holy Virgin Mary, and most worthy of all high praise: for out of thee has risen the sun of justice, Christ our God. Alleluia.”

-- the Gradual for the Feast of the Nativity of the Blessed Virgin.

Painting: by Erasmus Quellinus II, ‘The Nativity of the Virgin’, ca. 1655

09/08/2026

Please pray for the men preparing for the sacred priesthood at Our Lady of Guadalupe Seminary.

Your support of the Seminary Appeal helps sustain their years of prayer, study, and formation.

Make a gift to the Seminary Appeal: https://fssp.com/seminary-appeal/

📍Our Lady of Guadalupe Seminary in Denton, NE

09/08/2026

Beginning on September 7th…

09/07/2026

September 7th, Feast of Saint Cloud or Clodoald, Confessor, (522-560 AD)

Saint Cloud is the most illustrious Saint among the princes of the royal family of the first French dynasty, the Merovingians (499-752 AD). Born in 522 AD, he was the son of Chlodomir, King of Orleans and eldest son of Clovis and Saint Clotilda. He was not yet three years old when his father was killed during a war. His grandmother, Saint Clotilda, brought him and his two brothers to Paris to be educated, and loved them dearly.

Their ambitious uncles, however, desiring to divide the kingdom of Orleans between themselves, slew with their own hands the two young brothers of Cloud. He, by a special dispensation of Providence, was saved from the massacre. Later, renouncing the world, he privately consecrated himself to the service of God. After distributing to the poor what he could salvage of his heritage, he retired to a hermitage to be under the discipline of a holy recluse named Severinus, who dwelt near the gates of Paris and who clothed him with the monastic habit. His uncles left him alone, seeing his inalterable decision to live as a religious, and conceded certain heritages to him. When he became famous through an act of charity rewarded by a miracle, he withdrew secretly to Provence. There again, his hermitage was sought out by petitioners. He decided to return to Paris, where he was received with the greatest joy.

At the earnest request of the people, he was ordained a priest in 551AD by Eusebius, Bishop of Paris, and served the Church of that city for some time in the functions of the sacred ministry. Again he found himself in great honor; he therefore retired to Nogent, a place now known as Saint Cloud, two leagues south of Paris, where he built a monastery. There he was joined by many pious men, who fled from the world for fear of losing their souls in its midst. Saint Cloud was chosen by them to be their Superior, and he animated them to virtue both by word and example. He was also indefatigable in instructing and exhorting the in of the neighboring regions. He died at Nogent in 560, and the major part of his relics remain still in the parochial church of the village.

Reflection: Let us remember, as Saint Cloud did, that he who ruleth over men must be just (II Kings 23:3), and that it is by faith that the just man lives. (Cf. Galatians 3:11).

Les Petits Bollandistes: Vies des Saints, by Msgr. Paul Guérin (Bloud et Barral: Paris, 1882), Vol. 10; Little Pictorial Lives of the Saints, a compilation based on Butler's Lives of the Saints and other sources by John Gilmary Shea (Benziger Brothers: New York, 1894)

09/07/2026

On this day…
September 7, 1921, the Legion of Mary began in Dublin, Ireland and is now in every country of the world.

It is a lay apostolic association of Catholics who, with the sanction of the Church and under the powerful leadership of Mary Immaculate, Mediatrix of All Graces, serve the Church and their neighbor. Drawing its inspiration from the True Devotion to Mary, as taught by St. Louis Marie de Montfort the object of the Legion of Mary is the glory of God through the holiness of its members developed by prayer and active co-operation in Mary’s and the Church’s work.

09/06/2026

Pray the Rosary every day.

Bartolo Longo was born in 1841 in the Italian village of Latiano. His parents were devout Catholics and prayed the Rosary every day. A Young Radical However,

09/06/2026

The person who does not strive to become united with Him as frequently as possible has very little love for Jesus Christ.

September 5th, Feast of Saint Lawrence Justinian, First Patriarch of Venice, (1381-1455 A.D.)

Saint Lawrence, born in 1381 A.D., from his childhood longed to be a Saint, and when he was nineteen years of age he was given a vision of the Eternal Wisdom, in the form of a beautiful and noble Lady who told him to seek the only repose he would ever know in Her, the Eternal Wisdom of God. All earthly things paled in his eyes before the ineffable beauty of this sight, and as it faded away a void was left in his heart which none but God could fill. Refusing the offer of a brilliant marriage, at the age of nineteen he fled from his home in Venice and joined the Canons Regular of Saint George in their monastery, situated on a little island about a mile from Venice, where his uncle was a priest.

One by one he crushed every natural instinct which could bar his union with his Love. When Saint Lawrence first entered religion, a nobleman went to dissuade him from the folly of thus sacrificing every earthly prospect. The young monk listened patiently to his friend's affectionate appeal, which soon changed into scorn and violent abuse. Calmly and kindly he then replied. He pointed out the shortness of life, the uncertainty of earthly happiness, and the incomparable superiority of the prize he sought, to any pleasures his friend had named. The latter could make no answer; he felt in truth that Lawrence was wise, and he himself was the fool. And he too left the world, became a fellow-novice with the Saint, and eventually died a holy death.

As a monk, the mortification of Saint Lawrence was exemplary; he never drank outside of meals, and when urged to do so replied: “If we cannot endure a little heat on earth, how will we bear that of Purgatory?” He underwent two painful operations without saying any word except the Holy Name of Jesus. Before the second intervention, when the surgeon's hand trembled, he said, “Cut with vigor; your instrument cannot match the iron hooks used to tear the sides of the martyrs.”

Ordained a priest, then elected Superior and General of his Order, Saint Lawrence enlarged and strengthened his Order. Humility keeps silent and does not become inflated in prosperity, whereas in adversity it is elevated, magnanimous, full of joy and an invincible courage. Few know what this virtue is; it is possessed only by those to whom God has given it by infusion, as a reward for their persevering efforts and their spirit of prayer.

He encouraged frequent Communion, saying that the person who does not strive to become united with Him as frequently as possible has very little love for Jesus Christ. When he was consecrated bishop of his diocese in 1433 A.D., in the face of slander and insult he thoroughly reformed his see. He founded fifteen monasteries and many churches, and his cathedral became a model for all of Christendom. His door was never closed to the poor, but he himself lived like a poor monk.

His zeal led to his being appointed the first Patriarch of Venice, but he remained in heart and soul a humble priest, thirsting for the vision reserved for heaven. He had just finished writing his last work, ‘The Degrees of Perfection,’ when finally the eternal day began to dawn. He said, “Are you preparing a bed of feathers for me? No, my Lord was stretched on a hard and painful tree.” Laid upon straw, he exclaimed in rapture, “Good Jesus, behold, I come!” He died in 1455 A.D., at the age of seventy-four.

Reflection: Ask Saint Lawrence Justinian to obtain for you such a sense of the perfections of God, that you too may have recourse to Him in all your needs and be at rest.

Les Petits Bollandistes: Vies des Saints, by Msgr. Paul Guérin (Bloud et Barral: Paris, 1882), Vol. 10; Little Pictorial Lives of the Saints, a compilation based on Butler's Lives of the Saints and other sources by John Gilmary Shea (Benziger Brothers: New York, 1894).