Feast of Saint Stanislaus of Krakow (11 April 2018)

We here in the New World have a different concept of time from that in Europe.  Our city of New Orleans was founded in the year 1718, and we think of that as being a very long time ago.  When we visit our French Quarter with its old buildings, we marvel at their great age and think of them as being venerable because of their longevity.  But once, I was in a shop in Saint Francis’s town of Assisi, which seemed very old.  I asked the shopkeeper about its history.  She pointed out to me that there was an obvious demarcation between the upper and lower parts of the walls.  The upper part had been added to the building about the time of Saint Francis in the 13th century, while the lower, and original, part of the building had been put up about the time of Christ!   Amazing! 

 

On April 11, the Church celebrates the feast of Saint Stanislaus of Poland, a holy bishop of the city of Krakow.  Our Holy Father Pope John Paul II was also the bishop of Krakow at the time he was elected Pope; thus, he is the direct successor of Saint Stanislaus in that archdiocese.  And Saint Stanislaus became bishop of Krakow in the year 1072, four hundred years before the discovery of America and almost a thousand years ago from our present time.

 

At the time that Cardinal Newman came into the Church, he remarked that history is on our side.  Those who study history with an open mind cannot but be struck by the presence and the influence of Catholicism in western civilization for the past two millennia.  The Church was already 1000 years old when Saint Stanislaus became the bishop of Krakow, when the Norman conquest of England took place, and William the Conqueror began the construction of the Tower of London and Windsor Castle, that figure so prominently in British history and modern tourism, when the Crusaders built the basilica of the Holy Sepulcher in Jerusalem.   Against the time frame of the Church, we are indeed a NEW world; our great nation is less than 250 years old.  We are the heirs of our holy religion, which was brought to us by European missionaries, who in turn received it from the earlier missionaries from the Near East where Our Lord founded His Church.  And they had received the teachings of Our Lord from His Apostles themselves.

 

Let us try to be worthy of so venerable, so noble a heritage and put it into effective practice in our own lives.  Thank you for seeking God’s truth. God bless you. Father Victor Brown, O.P.

 

Note:  Father Brown composed this message some years ago.  Please pray for the souls of the faithful departed, including Father Brown.