Saint of the Day, Friday, September 21, 1973
by Plinio Corrêa de Oliveira
“A Roman and Apostolic Catholic, the author of this text submits himself with filial devotion to the traditional teaching of Holy Church. However, if by an oversight anything is found in it at variance with that teaching, he immediately and categorically rejects it.”
The words “Revolution” and “Counter-Revolution” are employed here in the sense given to them by Prof. Plinio Corrêa de Oliveira in his book Revolution and Counter-Revolution, the first edition of which was published in the monthly Catolicismo, Nº 100, April 1959.
The file on St. Francis Xavier is taken from his Letters and selected writings, so it is his text.
On this trip from Malacca to India, we went through many dangers in big storms for three days and three nights.
He is writing about his apostolate trips in the Far East. As you know, for a 16th-century ship to face a storm was something completely different from today’s ships. Their lives ran a severe danger, much more than in an airplane going through a storm today. Those little ships were like nutshells swaying in rough seas, so it was a grave danger indeed.
Many, while still alive, mourned their death beforehand and made great promises never to sail again if Our Lord delivered them. To save our lives, we threw into the sea everything we could.
You can imagine that tragic scene: they are throwing everything they had overboard to see if the ship became lighter and floated better. This shows the primitive conditions of this navigation: throwing cargoes overboard to make the boat lighter. The expression, throwing loads overboard, has remained to this day.
On the other hand, some mediocre minds make a meaningless promise to God never to sail again. What glory does God receive from the fact that they never sail again? But they promised God they would never sail again once they escaped. At the height of the storm, St. Francis commends himself to God.
In trouble, St. Francis Xavier takes as intercessors on earth all the members of the blessed Society of Jesus, with all its friends
I started by taking as earthly intercessors everyone in the blessed Society of Jesus with all their friends.
Of course, St. Francis Xavier did not pray only at the height of his predicament. But when it reached its height, instead of him becoming more distressed, he became more confident, as happens with Saints, and prayed to God most especially. He began by recommending himself – look at his idea – taking as intercessors on earth all the blessed Society of Jesus, with all their friends.
He was a Jesuit and knew that the Society of Jesus continually prayed for its members in danger. He knew that by praying for those and for his friends who were also praying, those prayers would gather together before the throne of God, and he could benefit from the prayers of these friends. So he prayed in union with them.
He continues:
With great fervor and help, I abandoned myself entirely to the most devout prayers of the Spouse of Christ, the Holy Mother Church. As long as She is on Earth, Jesus Christ, Her Spouse, continually hears Her in Heaven.
He expanded the scope of his prayers to include not only the Society of Jesus but all prayers the Catholic Church is saying all over the earth for those in danger, for her priests, men and women religious, asking to benefit from all those prayers at that moment.
You know that the Church is continually praying. The Mass is celebrated uninterruptedly. There are Masses 24/7/365 on the entire face of the earth. Today, unfortunately, In what painful conditions! But anyway, there are.
In them, the Body and Blood of Our Lord Jesus Christ are being offered once again. We can join in spirit the Mass truly pleasing to God being celebrated on some altar somewhere on earth.
The Mass is the official prayer of the Church; when the priest prays, the entire Church officially prays through the priest’s lips. So it is an official prayer.
Priests and nuns who recite the Canonical Hours in the choir are saying an official prayer of the Church. As we join the official prayers of the Church, the whole Church is praying for us. Furthermore, there are also private prayers; we can benefit from the prayers of all the faithful praying during the day for the afflicted or abandoned. So St. Francis asked for the prayers of the entire Catholic Church.
I did not forget to take as mediators all Saints in the glory of Paradise, starting above all with those who had belonged to the Society of Jesus; and I immediately asked the soul of blessed Pedro Fabro to intercede for me with all the deceased who belonged to the Society.
I would never finish listing the consolations received when I commended myself to God through Society members, living on earth and reigning in heaven. Amid danger, I placed myself in the hands of all Angels in their nine choirs and did the same with all the Patriarchs, Prophets, Apostles, Evangelists, Martyrs, Confessors and Virgins, and all the Saints in Heaven.
Imagine this beautiful scene: a small boat facing rough seas in the dead of night; everyone onboard is afflicted, and Saint Francis Xavier praying. While the ship shakes on all sides, he travels in spirit through the nine choirs of Angels, then venerates the Patriarchs, recommends himself to the Prophets, asking them one by one in a serene and calm visit. Astonished, those on board look at his tranquility and find in it the means to resist.
Invisible but real, beyond the clouds, the choirs of Angels, Patriarchs, and Prophets support the boat and prevent it from sinking. How beautiful this is, and how it can happen again in the life of a Catholic. He may be tried, afflicted, persecuted and all else, but can pay this heavenly visit to all the choirs of Angels, the Patriarchs, Apostles, Prophets, telling each one, “Look at the dire situation in which I am. Have pity on me and help me. For the sake of the bond between us, intercede with your prayers, as mine are not enough, etc.”
But we should do so calmly and confidently, as that is the position of a Catholic in danger. It is not to become terrified or alarmed but to grow in confidence. That is when a man truly grows in stature. So we can say: o blessed danger that allowed St. Francis Xavier to do such meditation! He thought the whole Church was praying for him, and right he was.
I believe that what he prayed at that time availed more to the Church than the whole Church availed to him because at that moment, he was the summit of the Church.
Saint Francis Xavier received so many graces from God that he felt stronger during the storm than after he weathered it.
Finally, putting all my hope in the infinite merits of the Passion and Death of Jesus, Our Lord and Redeemer, with all that fervor and help, I felt greatly comforted in that storm, perhaps more so than after being freed from it.
You have seen what sublimity he has reached. He received from God so much grace that he felt stronger during the storm than after he got rid of it.
Seeing such a great sinner shed tears of comfort and pleasure in such tribulation makes me feel a great shame when I think about it. For this reason, in the storm, I asked God Our Lord that should I be freed from it, it would only be to get into equally large or larger storms for His greatest service.
How different this is from a mediocre person who says, “I am not getting into another one.”
So you see how we must go through privations and trials in the Bagarre. We should not be like someone saying, “Wow, I escaped this one, now I’m heading for the woods.” May Our Lady give me even greater storms and trials as long as she gives me greater strength because that is the apex of consolation. You see how admirable the supernatural spirit is.
Many times God has allowed me to feel in my soul that He has freed me from many bodily dangers and [supported] spiritual works thanks to the devout and continuous sacrifices and prayers of those who militate in the blessed Society of Jesus and those who belonged to it and served it in this life and now triumph in glory.
God made him feel how valuable the Society’s prayers were.
Dearest fathers and brothers in Christ, I render you this account of how much I owe you so that everyone can help me pay for what I alone am not capable of, neither to God nor to you.
He asks everyone to give thanks for him because he is unable to give enough thanks.
When I start talking about this Holy Society of Jesus, I don’t know how to get out of such delightful communication; I don’t even know how to finish writing.
When he started talking about the Society, he had such joy over the flowering of its virtues at that time that he couldn’t stop talking or writing.
I see, however, that I am forced to finish without feeling like it or even knowing how because of the rush in which the ships are.
He was writing a letter, and the ships were about to leave.
I don’t know a better way to finish than to confess to everyone in the Society that if I ever forget about the Society of the Name of Jesus, let my right hand also be forgotten so many are the paths along which I have come to know how much I owe the Society.
By your merits, God Our Lord has granted me the grace to know my little capacity and what I owe the Holy Society…
To summarize the two central thoughts of the Saint of the Day, you have two lessons.
First, his idea of spiritual union with the Society of Jesus, the latter’s extraordinary value, and the confidence he had in the union of soul with the Society.
Secondly, the idea of how we should proceed in times of trouble during the Bagarre, supported by these prayers and praying as St. Francis Xavier did—that is, thinking first of all of Our Lady in the highest of heaven, who is the channel of the merits of Our Lord Jesus Christ to us; then thinking of the Angels in their various choirs, of the various Saints, etc.—to recommend ourselves to them, and to the prayers of the Catholic Church on the entire earth. According to the ways of Providence for each soul, it will happen to us what happened to him: the greater the danger, the greater confidence we will have, such that we will get out of danger by asking God to send us even greater dangers.
Here you see the relationship between the Catholic spirit and the spirit of chivalry. St. Francis is a great Saint who has a great abundance of the spirit of the Church, and that is why he was canonized. He faces the dangers of existence like a medieval knight faces those of war. It was characteristic of a knight that when he went from one battle to another, he never asked God (as any ordinary bourgeois would do): “My God, may I never get into another trouble.”
The knight was greedy for danger and adventure because he knew he was defending the cause for which he had been raised. And in every danger, he received graces to face even greater dangers. So we must face danger resolutely and with energy in everything that may happen in our existence, which can still be very stormy.