Vincent Ferrer

We see him in the midst of a neighboring people, the trusted guide of every class of Christians.

Every doubt that could arise from the exigencies of the 19th century concerning theology, politics, or even fashion, was submitted to his decision, and he answered one and all in words which might have fallen from St. Vincent Ferrer or the Blessed Leonard of Port Maurice.

Thus, when we hear of the numbers of all ranks and conditions who crowded from town and country into the secluded village church to hear his simple exhortations, our thoughts go back to the time when Pharisees and Sadducees, soldiers and publicans thronged the desert banks of the Jordan to hear the preaching of St. John the Baptist and to be told that they must do penance because the kingdom of heaven was at hand.

In perusing the instructions of the Curé of Ars, we may miss the sweetness of his voice or the bright look and affectionate manner with which they were wont to be accompanied.

He traveled in this way 800 leagues.

The good God can refuse nothing to a pure heart.

St. Vincent Ferrer worked so many miracles that his superior, fearing they might prove a snare to his humility, forbade him to exercise without permission the power he had received from God.

One day he was in adoration before our Lord, and a workman who was repairing the church fell from the top of a scaffold.

But after closely observing the holy priest for one or two days, they lost all desire to compare him to a town crier, and it was not long before they joined the crowd waiting for confession.

With still another class it required a direct call of grace, like St. Vincent Ferrer.

Father Vernier had received from God the gift of being able to read clearly into the conscience of a sinner.

Hence, almost every day it happened that one would see him come suddenly out of the sacristy and advance straight towards a person who had only just entered the church.

The people of Juchitán tell a story about this, and it is a story about seeds.

They say that San Vicente Ferrer, the patron saint of the town, was once traveling the world with three bags of seeds.

One bag held the seeds of men.

One bag held the seeds of women.

The town, on the whole, was glad to have them.

So here is the vela on the weekend before the twentieth of November, every year since.

It begins in the afternoon at the Church of San Vicente Ferrer, the saint of the three bags of seeds.

The muxes attend mass in their finest huipiles.

Um, Who asked you? Was it down at St.

Vincent Ferrer?

St. Vincent Ferrer, yeah.

Because I had been working, I forgot if it was the year of the Eucharistic pilgrimage or something, but I've been working with one of the Dominicans and I saw him at a bunch of events.

Who would your congregation have been? I think that, I don't know.

It is in times such as these when the, quote, salt is most needed, when a relatively few souls can tip the balance in the divine scales by not only doing penance for their own sins, but also offering reparation for the sins of the world.

It was in this way that the graces were won by those who responded to the call of St. Vincent Ferrer, bringing an end to the Western schism, and by the Catholics of Austria who prayed a rosary crusade and freed their nation of communism, On other generations, the lesson was lost and their end was tragic.

Cain, Lamech, the worshippers of the golden calf, Saul and Solomon, the ten northern tribes destroyed by the Assyrians, Jerusalem laid waste by the Babylonians, the temple desecrated by the Syrian Greeks.

The list goes on to the point where the Jews' religious leaders demanded the crucifixion of the Son of God, even claiming that they had no king but Caesar, and calling down our Lord's innocent blood upon themselves and their children.

And it was not long before they joined the crowd waiting for confession.

With still another classic required a direct call of grace, like Saint Vincent Ferrer.

Father Vianney had received from God the gift of being able to read clearly into the conscience of a sinner.

Hence, almost every day it happened that one would see him come suddenly out of the sacristy and advance straight towards a person who had only just entered the church.

Yeah.

Oh, no. St. Vincent Ferrer, which, by the way, I have a relic of his in our chapel.

St. Vincent Ferrer.

His preaching was so very successful that he got kicked out of Granada.

I think it was Granada.

We see men as it were trees walking, but in a little while all become self-evident as the light of day.

it was by this internal light that saints have called themselves the chief of sinners that st clare wondered that her sisters did not shun her as one stricken with the plague st vincent ferrer used to say that he daily grew worse and worse it was this that made st francis borgia construct what he called the ladder of confusion that is he first placed himself before the holy trinity and was overwhelmed by the contrast of the uncreated sanctity with our created infirmity next he placed himself in the light of the sacred humanity and confounded himself at the sight of his own nature so shattered and defaced then in the presence of the immaculate mother of god a mere creature though god's mother and humbled himself for the soils and stains of both original and actual sin then before the holy angels and condemned his own tardy and lingering obedience by the energy and fervor of their ministries then of the saints and by their perseverance he measured his own inconstancy THEN OF THE SERVANTS OF GOD ON EARTH, OF WHOM HE PROFESSED HIMSELF TO BE THE LEAST.

THEN OF THE SOULS IN PURGATORY, OF WHOM THE LEAST HUMBLE IS MORE PROFOUNDLY HUMBLE THAN ANY SAINT ON EARTH.

THEN OF THE SOULS THAT ARE LOST, CONFESSING THAT IF THEY HAD RECEIVED HIS GRACE, THEY WOULD HAVE BEEN HOLIER AND MORE PENITENT THAN HIMSELF.

Some have most of it whose sins are lightest and fewest, for it is a perception depending upon what we are.

And the most saintly hearts are the most illuminated.

I have already quoted St. Clair, St. Vincent Ferrer, and St. Francis Borgia as proofs.

I might take one more example, and that from Saint Paul, who says that Christ Jesus came into this world to save sinners, of whom I am the chief.