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Saints Feast Days                                                                          UNITY

                                                                                                          I
                                                   Feast of Guardian Angels - October 2


                                               erhaps no aspect of Catholic piety is as comforting to parents as the belief
                                               that an angel protects their little ones from dangers real and imagined.
                                           PYet guardian angels are not only for children. Their role is to represent
                                           individuals before God, to watch over them always, to aid their prayer, and to
                                           present their souls to God at death.
                                           The concept of an angel assigned to guide and nurture each human being is a
                                           development of Catholic doctrine and piety based on Scripture but not directly
                                           drawn from it. Jesus’ words in Matthew 18:10 best support the belief: “See that
                                           you do not despise one of these little ones, for I say to you that their angels in
                                           heaven always look upon the face of my heavenly Father.”
                                           Devotion to the angels began to develop with the birth of the monastic tradition.
                                           Saint Benedict gave it impetus and Saint Bernard of Clairvaux, the great 12th-
                                           century reformer, was such an eloquent spokesman for the guardian angels
                                           that angelic devotion assumed its current form in his day.
                                           A feast in honor of the guardian angels was first observed in the 16th century.
                                           In 1615, Pope Paul V added it to the Roman calendar.
                                                                         Reflection
                                            Devotion to the angels is, at base, an expression of faith in God’s enduring
                                             love and providential care extended to each person day in and day out.




                  Feast of St. Luke - October 18                                                        Our

                                                                                                        Lady
                                           uke  is  first  mentioned  in
                                           the  letters  of  Paul  as  the                             of the
                                       Llatter’s  “coworker” and  as  the
                                       “beloved  physician.” The  former                              Rosary
                                       designation  is  the  more  significant
                                       one,  for it  identifies him as  one of                             -
                                       a  professional cadre  of  itinerant
                                       Christian “workers,” many of whom                             October
                                       were   teachers  and   preachers.
                                       His  medical skills,  like  Paul’s
                                       tentmaking,  may  have  contributed                                7
                                       to his livelihood; but his principal
                                       occupation was the advancement of
                                       the Christian mission.

                                       If Luke was the author of the third
                                       Gospel and the Acts of the Apostles,
                                       the course and nature of his ministry
                                       may be sketched in more detail from
                                       both  texts.  He  excludes  himself
                                       from those who were eyewitnesses
         of Christ’s ministry. He indicates participation in the Pauline mission by
         the use of the first person in the “we” sections of Acts. They suggest
         that Luke shared in instructing persons in the Christian message and
         possibly in performing miraculous healings.

         The  “we” sections  are  analogous  in style  to  travel reports  found
         elsewhere  in  writings  of  the  Greco-Roman  period.  They  place  the
         author with Paul during his initial mission into Greece—i.e., as far as
         Philippi, in Macedonia (c. 51 CE). It is there that Luke later rejoins Paul
         and accompanies him on his final journey to Jerusalem (c. 58 CE).
         After Paul’s arrest in that city and during his extended detention in
         nearby Caesarea, Luke may have spent considerable time in Palestine
         working  with the  apostle  as  the  occasion  allowed and  gathering
         materials for his future two-volume literary work, the Gospel and the
         Acts. In any case, two years later he appears with Paul on his prison
         voyage from Caesarea to Rome and again, according to the Second
         Letter of Paul to Timothy 4:11, at the time of the apostle’s martyrdom
         in the imperial city (c. 66 CE).
         (Taken from the Encyclopaedia Britannica)
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