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At three different times in his missions, while preaching, a ray of light from a picture of Our Lady darted towards him, and he fell into an ecstasy before the people. Of extraordinary passive states, such as rapture, there are not many instances recorded in his life, though there are some. St. Alphonsus Liguori Opening Prayer My Lord Jesus Christ, you have made this journey to die for me with infinite love. This was to be a momentous revolution for Alphonsus. A fearful commotion arose. The priest was Alphonsus. This was in 1780, when Alphonsus was eighty-three years old. For six years he laboured in and around Naples, giving missions for the Propaganda and preaching to the lazzaroni of the capital. To this Alphonsus by the advice of his director, Father Thomas Pagano, himself an Oratorian, agreed. [15] The church did not bestow this unique privilege lightly but was due to the extraordinary combination of exceptional knowledge and understanding of church teachings combined with the great precision in which he wrote. Alphonsus himself was not spared. where the Hosts were buried. Mimoires sur la vie et la congrigation de St. Alphonse de Liguori (Paris, 1842, 3 vols.). In 1762 Pope Clement XIII made him bishop of Sant Agata del Goti near Naples; he resigned in 1775 because of ill health. He could never have said Mass again had not an Augustinian prior shown him how to support himself on a chair so that with the assistance of an acolyte he could raise the chalice to his lips. After a short interval--we do not know exactly how long--the answer came. It is remarkable that only 25 years after the Scapular vision, Blessed Pope Gregory X was buried In 1719, together with a Father Filangieri, also one of the "Pii Operarii", he had refounded a Conservatorium of religious women at Scala on the mountains behind Amalfi. He is credited with the position of Aequiprobabilism, which avoided Jansenist rigorism as well as laxism and simple probabilism. He was a lawyer by the time he was 16 years old! The immediate author of what was practically a lifelong persecution of the Saint was the Marquis Tanucci, who entered Naples in 1734. [16] The 21,500 editions and the translations into 72 languages that his works have undergone attest to the fact that he is one of the most widely-read Catholic authors. He spent the next few years in recasting this work, and in 1753 appeared the first volume of the "Theologia Moralis", the second volume, dedicated to Benedict XIV, following in 1755. Educated at the University of Naples, Alphonsus received his doctorate at the age of sixteen. It saw only recently its first publication in translation, in an English translation made by Ryan Grant and published in 2017 by Mediatrix Press. Early Christians began the devotion of following the footsteps of Christ's passion. Calendarium Romanum (Libreria Editrice Vaticana 1969), p. 99, Appendix to his work on the Council of Trent, Saint Alphonsus Liguori, patron saint archive, St. Alphonsus 'Rock' Liguori Church (St. Louis), "St. Alphonsus Liguori, Our Founder", Redemptorists, Baltimore Province, Tannoja, Antonio. "The life of St. Alphonsus Maria de Liguori" (1855)John Murphy & Co., Baltimore, 1855, "Saint Alphonsus Maria de Liguori", St. Alphonsus Liguori Parish, Peterborough, Ontario, The life of St. Alphonsus Maria de Liguori, Bishop of St. Agatha of the Goths and founder of the Congregation of the Holy Redeemer, Tannoja, Antonio (d. 1808), John Murphy & Co. (1855), "CATHOLIC ENCYCLOPEDIA: St. Alphonsus Liguori", "Alphonsus Maria de Liguori", Saint Alphonsus Mary de Liguori Parish, Makati City Philippines, "1st English Translation of St. Alphonsus Liguori's Moral Theology", https://www.avemarialynnfield.org/sites/g/files/zjfyce466/files/2021-01/Stations-of-the-Cross-St-Liguori.pdf, Liguori, Alphonsus. New York: Robert Appleton Company. But how was Alphonsus to grow in this so necessary virtue when he was in authority nearly all his life? Furthermore, St. Alphonsus was a great theologian, and so attached much weight to intrinsic probability. Paths to Heaven; Revelations. Much of the material for a complete life of St. Alphonsus is still in manuscript in the Roman archives of the Redemptorist Congregation and in the archives of the Sacred Congregation of Bishops and Regulars. [4] Myopia and chronic asthma precluded a military career so his father had him educated in the legal profession. Liguori was a prolific and popular author. Theabbot of that monastery soon after visited it, and attempted to reform it, but he didnot succeed; and one day he saw a great number of demons entering the cells of all thenuns except that of Jane, for the heavenly mother, before whose image he saw herpraying, banished them from that. No doubt Thomas Falcoia had for some time hoped that the ardent young priest, who was so devoted to him, might, under his direction, be the founder of the new Order he had at heart. St. Alphonsus Liguori Catholic Church is known far and wide as "The Rock." The parish is staffed by the Redemptorists, making history in 1922 when it began the weekly novena in honor of Our Mother of Perpetual Help. This article was transcribed for New Advent by Paul T. Crowley. These form the first book of the work, while the second contains the treatises on Faith, Hope, and Charity. He was declared "Venerable", 4 May, 1796; was beatified in 1816, and canonized in 1839. In addition his father made him practice the harpsichord for three hours a day, and at the age of thirteen he played with the perfection of a master. Catholic Encyclopedia. When he was preparing for the priesthood in Naples, his masters were of the rigid school, for though the center of Jansenistic disturbance was in northern Europe, no shore was so remote as not to feel the ripple of its waves. According to this view he chose a different formula from the Jesuit writers, partly because he thought his own terms more exact, and, partly to save his teaching and his congregation as far as possible from the State persecution which after 1764 had already fallen so heavily on the Society of Jesus, and in 1773 was formally to suppress it. This document gives you the case." An interesting series of portraits might be painted of those who play a part in the Saint's history: Charles III and his minister Tanucci; Charle's son Ferdinand, and Ferdinand's strange and unhappy Queen, Maria Carolina, daughter of Maria Teresa and sister of Marie Antoinette. The Saint's mother was of Spanish descent, and if, as there can be little doubt, race is an element in individual character, we may see in Alphonsus's Spanish blood some explanation of the enormous tenacity of purpose which distinguished him from his earliest years. Office Hours: Mon - Fri: 8am-4pm, Saturday: 9am-12pm . Liguori suffered from scruples much of his adult life and felt guilty about the most minor issues relating to sin. It is not necessary to notice certain non-Catholic attacks on Alphonsus as a patron of lying. He often writes as a Neapolitan to Neapolitans. His sermons were very effective at converting those who had been alienated from their faith. Alphonsus was lawyer, founder, religious superior, bishop, theologian, and mystic, but he was above all a missionary, and no true biography of the Saint will neglect to give this due prominence. It will be remembered that even as a young man his chief distress at his breakdown in court was the fear that his mistake might be ascribed to deceit. Ever mindful of his own sins, Saint Alphonsus saw prayer for the faithful departed as one of the chief duties of Christian charity. By age nineteen he was practicing law, but he saw the transitory nature of the secular world, and after a brief time, retreated from the law courts and his fame. St. Paul of the Cross (1694-1775) and St. Alphonsus, who were altogether contemporaries, seem never to have met on earth, though the founder of the Passionists was a great friend of Alphonsus's uncle, Mgr. (1913). If we except a few poems published in 1733 (the Saint was born in 1696), his first work, a tiny volume called "Visits to the Blessed Sacrament", only appeared in 1744 or 1745, when he was nearly fifty years old. Let us know if you have suggestions to improve this article (requires login). In addition, he published many editions of compendiums of his larger work, such as the "Homo Apostolicus", made in 1759. He died on the very eve of the great Revolution which was to sweep the persecutors away, having seen in vision the woes which the French invasion of 1798 was to bring on Naples. The difficulty about strong wills and strong passions is that they are hard to tame, but when they are tamed they are the raw material of sanctity. He was more concerned with the spiritual conflict which was going on at the same time. Copyright 2022 Catholic Online. Dignity and Duties of the Priest, Eugene Grimm ed., Benziger Brothers, New York, 1889, Free scores by Alphonsus Maria de' Liguori in the Choral Public Domain Library (ChoralWiki), "St Alphonsus", St. Alphonsus on Catholic Online, https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Alphonsus_Liguori&oldid=1141126599, Founders of Catholic religious communities, 18th-century Italian Roman Catholic bishops, 18th-century Italian Roman Catholic theologians, Articles incorporating a citation from the 1913 Catholic Encyclopedia with Wikisource reference, Articles incorporating text from the 1913 Catholic Encyclopedia with Wikisource reference, All articles with bare URLs for citations, Articles with bare URLs for citations from March 2022, Articles with PDF format bare URLs for citations, Articles containing Neapolitan-language text, Articles containing Italian-language text, Pages using sidebar with the child parameter, Articles incorporating a citation from the 1913 Catholic Encyclopedia without Wikisource reference, Articles incorporating text from the 1913 Catholic Encyclopedia without Wikisource reference, Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike License 3.0, Bishop, Moral Theologian, Confessor and Doctor of the Church, This page was last edited on 23 February 2023, at 13:49. The foundation of all subsequent lives is the Della vita ed istituto del venerabile Alfonso Maria Liguori, of ANTONY TANNOIA, one of the great biographies of literature. In 1723 there was a lawsuit in the courts between a Neapolitan nobleman, whose name has not come down to us, and the Grand Duke of Tuscany, in which property valued at 500,000 ducats, that to say, $500,000 or 100,000 pounds, was at stake. Castle, H. (1907). . "Let us have it." Both last about two hours but are filled with soul-stirring music. He was the eldest of seven children and the hope of his house. In 1780, a crisis arose in which they did this, yet in such a way as to bring division in the Congregation and extreme suffering and disgrace upon its founder. Some persons, boasting of being free from prejudices, take great credit to themselvesfor believing no miracles but those recorded in the holy scriptures, esteeming all others. In response, Alphonsus dedicated himself to the religious life, even while suffering persecution from his family. It was comparatively late in life that Alphonsus became a writer. He felt as if his career was ruined, and left the court almost beside himself, saying: "World, I know you now. But as he drew up a rule for them, formed from that of the Visitation nuns, he does not seem to have had any clear idea of establishing the new institute of his vision. The Saint's complete dogmatic works have been translated into Latin by P. WALTER, C.SS.R., S. Alphonsi Mariae de Liguori Ecclesiae Doctoris Opera Dogmatica, (New York, 1903, 2 vols., 4to). Were the vehement things in his letters and writings, especially in the matter of rebuke or complaint, to appraised as if uttered by an Anglo-Saxon in cold blood, we might be surprised and even shocked. Even its Rule was made known to her. "What document is that?" It was this which made him the prince of moral theologians, and gained him, when canonization made it possible, the title of "Doctor of the Church". With Don Carlos, or as he is generally called, Charles III, from his later title as King of Spain, came the lawyer, Bernard Tanucci, who governed Naples as Prime Minister and regent for the next forty-two years. To come to saints, the great Jesuit missionary St. Francis di Geronimo took the little Alphonsus in his arms, blessed him, and prophesied that he would do great work for God; while a Franciscan, St. John Joseph of the Cross, was well known to Alphonsus in later life. He lived his first years as a priest with the homeless and the marginalized youth of Naples. Alphonsus's father, Don Joseph de' Liguori was a naval officer and Captain of the Royal Galleys. +John Cardinal Farley, Archbishop of New York. Riding and fencing were his recreations, and an evening game of cards; he tells us that he was debarred from being a good shot by his bad sight. St. Alphonsus appeared a miracle of calm to Tannoia. In the end the Rule was so altered as to be hardly recognizable, the very vows of religion being abolished. Neapolitan students, in an animated but amicable discussion, seem to foreign eyes to be taking part in a violent quarrel. The Vicar General, Monsignor Onorati drew up the minutes of the diocesan trial which lasted two years from 1772 to 1774. He finally agreed to become a priest but to live at home as a member of a group of secular missionaries. Matters remained thus for some years. "[17][18], Liguori's greatest contribution to the Catholic Church was in the area of moral theology. The family was of noble lineage, but the branch to which Liguori belonged had become somewhat impoverished. The Saint only wept in silence and tried in vain to devise some means by which his Order might be saved. Deposed and excluded from his own congregation, Alphonsus suffered great anguish. Very few remarks upon his own times occur in the Saint's letters. [11], Liguori was consecrated Bishop of Sant'Agata dei Goti in 1762. Alphonsus Mary Antony John Cosmas Damian Michael Gaspard de' Liguori was born in his father's country house at Marianella near Naples, on Tuesday, 27 September, 1696. Alphonsus was a devoted friend of the Society of Jesus and its long persecution by the Bourbon Courts, ending in its suppression in 1773, filled him with grief. In old age he was more than once raised in the air when speaking of God. St. Alphonsus Liguori's prayer to Jesus Christ to obtain His holy love comes from the "Rule of Life", a guide for growing in holiness. A companion, Balthasar Cito, who afterwards became a distinguished judge, was asked in later years if Alphonsus had ever shown signs of levity in his youth. A justly celebrated life is the Vie et Institut de Saint Alphonse-Marie de Liguori, in four volumes, by CARDINAL VILLECOURT, (Tournai, 1893). She was told to write it down and show it to the director of the convent, that is to Falcoia himself. See also HASSALL, The Balance of Power (1715-89) (London, 1901); COLLETTA, History of the Kingdom of Naples, 1734-1825, 2 vols., tr. The basic elements of an Act of Spiritual Communion are an Act of Faith, an Act of Love, a desire to receive Christ, and an . Eight times during his long life, without counting his last sickness, the Saint received the sacraments of the dying, but the worst of all his illnesses was a terrible attack of rheumatic fever during his episcopate, an attack which lasted from May, 1768, to June, 1769, and left him paralyzed to the end of his days. Please help support the mission of New Advent and get the full contents of this website as an instant download. In all this there was no serious sin, but there was no high sanctity either, and God, Who wished His servant to be a saint and a great saint, was now to make him take the road to Damascus. He is said never to have refused absolution to a penitent. His infirmities were increasing, and he was occupied a good deal with his writings. The Ceremonies of the Interment. At the age of sixteen, on 21 January, 1713, he took his degree as Doctor of Laws, although twenty was the age fixed by the statutes. "St. Alphonsus Liguori". As he did not die till 1808 (his work appeared in 1799) he was a companion of the Saint for over forty years and an eyewitness of much that he relates. "Banquets, entertainments, theatres," he wrote later on--"these are the pleasures of the world, but pleasures which are filled with the bitterness of gall and sharp thorns. His very confessor and vicar general in the government of his Order, Father Andrew Villani, joined in the conspiracy. Saint Alphonsus Maria de' Liguori, C.Ss.R. Hi readers, it seems you use Catholic Online a lot; that's great! My email address is webmaster at newadvent.org. Alphonsus' last illness and Deaths 548 CHAPTER XXXVII. Alphonsus was the oldest of seven children, raised by a devout mother of Spanish descent. A year of trouble and anxiety followed. APA citation. Alphonsus was not sent to school but was educated by tutors under his father's eye. Dissensions arose, the Saint's former friend and chief companion, Vincent Mannarini, opposing him and Falcoia in everything. In 1724, soon after Alphonsus left the world, a postulant, Julia Crostarosa, born in Naples on 31 October, 1696, and hence almost the same age as the Saint, entered the convent of Scala. St. Alphonsus Liguori was a bishop and moral theologian living and preaching in Naples in the eighteenth century. If any reader of this article will go to original sources and study the Saint's life at greater length, he will not find his labour thrown away. [5] He founded the Evening Chapels, which were managed by the young people themselves. MIRACLES RELATED BY ST. ALPHONSUS LIGUORI from his book The Glories of Mary Some persons, boasting of being free from prejudices, take great credit to themselves for believing no miracles but those recorded in the holy scriptures, esteeming all others as tales and fables for foolish women. "Alphonsus was of middle height", says his first biographer, Tannoia; "his head was rather large, his hair black, and beard well-grown." A few months later Alphonsus left his father's house and went to live with Ripa, without, however, becoming a member of his society. The childish fault for which he most reproached himself in after-life was resisting his father too strongly when he was told to take part in a drawing-room play. [2][3], He was born in Marianella, near Naples, then part of the Kingdom of Naples, on 27 September 1696. Both of them were canonized on the same day as the Holy Doctor, 26 May, 1839. Unfortunately, he was not obliged by his confessor, in virtue of holy obedience, as St. Teresa was, to write down his states of prayer; so we do not know precisely what they were. The "Moral Theology", after a historical introduction by the Saint's friend, P. Zaccaria, S.J., which was omitted, however, from the eighth and ninth editions, begins with a treatise "De Conscientia", followed by one "De Legibus". St. Alphonsus Mary de Liguori, Doctor of the Church . First Station: Jesus Is Condemned to Death V. We adore you, Christ, and we praise you. St. Alphonsus likened the conflict between law and liberty to a civil action in which the law has the onus probandi, although greater probabilities give it a verdict. This occurred twice. [4] When he was 18, like many other nobles, he joined the Confraternity of Our Lady of Mercy, with whom he assisted in the care of the sick at the hospital for "incurables". His hymns are justly celebrated in Italy. Alphonsus's temperament was very ardent. (Rome, 1896). He called his system Equiprobabilism. His own prayer was perhaps for the most part what some call "active", others "ordinary", contemplation. By AClarke625. In the second edition the work received the definite form it has since retained, though in later issues the Saint retracted a number of opinions, corrected minor ones, and worked at the statement of his theory of Equiprobabilism till at last he considered it complete. Though St. Alphonsus was founder and de facto head of the Institute, its general direction in the beginning, as well as the direction of Alphonsus's conscience, was undertaken by the Bishop of Castellamare and it was not till the latter's death, 20 April, 1743, that a general chapter was held and the Saint was formally elected Superior-General. New York: Robert Appleton Company. A centenary edition, Lettere di S. Alfonso Maria de'Liguori (ROME, 1887, 3 vols. When we cannot make it to daily Mass, however, we can still make an Act of Spiritual Communion. The Holy Father addressed the faithful taking part in the General audience of Wednesday, 1 August [2012], in Piazza della Libert, the square outside the Papal residence in Castel Gandolfo. The Holy Mass, Eugene Grimm ed., Benziger Brothers, New York, 1887, Liguori, Alphonsus. Alphonsus said nothing in his "Moral Theology" which is not the common teaching of Catholic theologians. Here St. Alphonsus teaches that those who refuse to bow to the will of God only double their afflictions. 1. In vain those around him and even the judge on the bench tried to console him. at last came peace, and on 1 August, 1787, as the midday Angelus was ringing, the Saint passed peacefully to his reward. Ultimately, however, anything merely human in this had disappeared. In 1762 he was appointed Bishop of Sant'Agata dei Goti. R. The chapels were centres of prayer and piety, preaching, community, social activities, and education. Resuming the General Audiences after the summer break the last was held on 27 June in the Vatican the Pope . The dissensions even spread to the nuns, and Sister Maria Celeste herself left Scala and founded a convent at Foggia, where she died in the odour of sanctity, 14 September, 1755. You have overlooked a document which destroys your whole case." The eighteenth century was not an age remarkable for depth of spiritual life, yet it produced three of the greatest missionaries of the Church, St. Leonard of Port Maurice, St. Paul of the Cross, and St. Alphonsus Liguori. St. Alphonsus encouraged an intimate, personal relationship with Jesus Christ through frequent visits to the Blessed Sacrament. There are two Sunday services, one at 8:15 and the second at 11. Even when taking him into society in order to arrange a good marriage for him, he wished Alphonsus to put God first, and every year father and son would make a retreat together in some religious house. Alphonsus, assisted by divine grace, did not disappoint his father's care. Fearful temptations against every virtue crowded upon him, together with diabolical apparitions and illusions, and terrible scruples and impulses to despair which made life a hell. One of the most widely read Catholic authors, he is the patron saint of confessors. The extreme difficulty of the lifelong work of fashioning a saint consists precisely in this, that every act of virtue the saint performs goes to strengthen his character, that is, his will. "You have founded the Congregation and you have destroyed it", said one Father to him. Soon after, Falcoia made known to the latter his vocation to leave Naples and establish an order of missionaries at Scala, who should work above all for the neglected goatherds of the mountains. March 1, 1907. Here he laid his sword before the statue of Our Lady, and made a solemn resolution to enter the ecclesiastical state, and furthermore to offer himself as a novice to the Fathers of the Oratory. He answered emphatically: "Never! Alphonsus agreed to both requests and set out with his two friends, John Mazzini and Vincent Mannarini, in September, 1730. He had even tried to form a branch of the Institute by uniting twelve priests in a common life at Tarentum, but the community soon broke up. But before he called a witness the opposing counsel said to him in chilling tones: "Your arguments are wasted breath. Still there was a time of danger. But when the question was put to the community, opposition began. It is a matter for friendly controversy, but it seems there was a real difference, though not as great in practice as is supposed, between the Saint's later teaching and that current in the Society. The third book deals with the Ten Commandments, the fourth with the monastic and clerical states, and the duties of judges, advocates, doctors, merchants, and others. Patron saint of: people with arthritis, lawyers, vocations. He had nearly completed his ninety-first year. At all events, it proved disastrous in the result. . I will love you all my life. This prayer is a petition asking for the grace to love God more, so as to fear hell and desire to do His . This Novena for the Holy Souls in Purgatory was written by St. Alphonsus Liguori (1696-1787), a bishop and founder of the Redemptorist order, and one of the Doctors of the Church. She was declared Venerable 11 August, 1901. It was approved by the king and forced upon the stupefied Congregation by the whole power of the State. [4] He was ordained on 21 December 1726, at the age of 30. By 1777, the Saint, in addition to four houses in Naples and one in Sicily, had four others at Scifelli, Frosinone, St. Angelo a Cupolo, and Beneventum, in the States of the Church.