St. Alphonsus Liguori, the Prince of Moral Theologians, was one of the greatest preachers in Church history. There were whole years, indeed, in which the Institute seemed on the verge of summary suppression. 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. He was taught by tutors before entering the University of Naples, where he graduated with doctorates in civil and canon law at 16. Besides his Moral Theology, the Saint wrote a large number of dogmatic and ascetical works nearly all in the vernacular. 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. The differentia of saints is not faultlessness but driving-power, a driving-power exerted in generous self-sacrifice and ardent love of God. Let us know if you have suggestions to improve this article (requires login). It was all-important to the Fathers to be able to rebut the charge of being an illegal religious congregation, which was one of the chief allegations in the ever-adjourned and ever-impending action by Baron Sarnelli. Saint Alphonsus Liguori described in detail this miracle and took the opportunity to reawake the faith and devotion of the people towards the Eucharist. First Station: Jesus Is Condemned to Death V. We adore you, Christ, and we praise you. This lifelong friendship aided Alphonsus, as did his association with a mystic, Sister Mary Celeste. Could he have been what an Anglo-Saxon would consider a miracle of calm, he would have seemed to his companions absolutely inhuman. It was comparatively late in life that Alphonsus became a writer. His best plan would have been to consult the Holy See, but in this he had been forestalled. His writings on moral, theological, and ascetic matters had great impact and have survived through the years, especially his Moral Theology and his Glories of Mary. Key Concepts; Teachings; Visions; Search Revelations . A piece of evidence was handed to him which he had read and re-read many times, but always in a sense the exact contrary of that which he now saw it to have. Finally, St. Alphonsus was a wonderful letter-writer, and the mere salvage of his correspondence amounts to 1,451 letters, filling three large volumes. Father Francis de Paula, one of the chief appellants, was appointed their Superior General, "in place of those", so the brief ran, "who being higher superiors of the said Congregation have with their followers adopted a new system essentially different from the old, and have deserted the Institute in which they were professed, and have thereby ceased to be members of the Congregation." He had nearly completed his ninety-first year. 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. He was canonized in 1839 by Pope Gregory XVI and proclaimed a Doctor of the Church by Pope Pius IX in 1871. [4] He was ordained on 21 December 1726, at the age of 30. He was not afraid of making up his mind. by S. HORNER (Edinburgh, 1858); VON REUMONT, Die Carafa von Maddaloni (Berlin, 1851, 2 vols. First Station: Jesus is condemned to death, Saint of the Day for Saturday, March 4th, 2023, Sixth Station: Veronica wipes the face of Jesus, Eighth Station: Jesus meets the women of Jerusalem. 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. ), was published by P. KUNTZ, C.SS.R., director of the Roman archives of his Congregation. Thank you. Alphonsus Liguori. It may be he was even too anxious, and on one occasion when he was over-whelmed by a fresh refusal, his friend the Marquis Brancone, Minister for Ecclesiastical Affairs and a man of deep piety, said to him gently: "It would seem as if you placed all your trust here below"; on which the Saint recovered his peace of mind. Under the government of the Marquis della Sambuca, who, though a great regalist, was a personal friend of the Saint's, there was promise of better times, and in August, 1779, Alphonsus's hopes were raised by the publication of a royal decree allowing him to appoint superiors in his Congregation and to have a novitiate and house of studies. 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. Infidelity and impiety were gaining ground; Voltaire and Rousseau were the idols of society; and the ancien rgime, by undermining religion, its one support, was tottering to its fall. So bent was it in the beginning, that the pressure of his chin produced a dangerous wound in the chest. But when the question was put to the community, opposition began. Your gift is tax-deductible as allowed by law. He was now free, subject to the approval of the Bishop of Scala, to act with regard to the convent as he thought best. "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. St. Alphonsus appeared a miracle of calm to Tannoia. Vol. The priest was Alphonsus. Ever mindful of his own sins, Saint Alphonsus saw prayer for the faithful departed as one of the chief duties of Christian charity. As it was traditionally associated with the zampogna, or large-format Italian bagpipe, it became known as Canzone d'i zampognari, the "Carol of the Bagpipers". 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. "I follow my conscience", he wrote in 1764, "and when reason persuades me I make little account of moralists." 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. 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. This is a historic Catholic Church in mid-town St. Louis. At the worst, it was only the scaffolding by which the temple of perfection was raised. The chapels were centres of prayer and piety, preaching, community, social activities, and education. 1. Nov 2012. A star preacher, he called his fellow sermonizers on the carpet for sermons of "empty, rumbling rhetoric" or "flashy . 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. For three days he refused all food. Could he have been what an Anglo-Saxon would consider a miracle of calm, he would have seemed to his companions absolutely inhuman. His spirituality was both affective and active, centered above all on the passion of Jesus Christ as the principal sign of our Savior's love for us. 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. Saint Alphonsus De Liguori Usage Public Domain Topics Blessed Virgin Mary, Miracles, Apparitions, Conversion, Saints, Rosary, Sin, Repentance, Catholic Collection opensource Language English Stories from St Alphonsus De Liguori, which he culled from various sources, which can be seen in the larger work, "The Glories of Mary". The favors and graces by which God attested his sanctity 526 CHAPTER XXXVI. In the end a compromise was arrived at. Now the saint has a very great momentum indeed, and a spoiled saint is often a great villain. He started again, recruited new members, and in 1743 became the prior of two new congregations, one for men and one for women. His sermons were very effective at converting those who had been alienated from their faith. 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. Nihil Obstat. Alphonsus's father, Don Joseph de' Liguori was a naval officer and Captain of the Royal Galleys. In the last years of his life, he suffered a painful sickness and bitter persecution from his fellow priests, who dismissed him from the Congregation that he had founded. This article was transcribed for New Advent by Paul T. Crowley. Imprimatur. The Government throughout had recognized the good effect of his missions, but it wished the missionaries to be secular priests and not a religious order. With their aid, Aiphonsus founded the Congregation of the Most Holy Redeemer on November 9, 1732. He was not allowed to resign his see, however, until 1775. In bestowing the title of "Prince of Moral Theologians", the church also gave the "unprecedented honour she paid to the Saint in her Decree of 22 July 1831, which allows confessors to follow any of St. Alphonsus's own opinions without weighing the reasons on which they were based". Alphonsus, however, was unflagging in his efforts with the Court. It survived a catastrophic fire and was completed refurbished. We're not salespeople, but we depend on donations averaging $14.76 and fewer than 1% of readers give. More than once he faced assassination unmoved. It is the following of Jesus as a community of disciples, aware that we are sent to be a clear . But he was a man of genuine faith and piety and stainless life, and he meant his son to be the same. 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. His hymns are justly celebrated in Italy. After 1752 Alphonsus gave fewer missions. The family was of noble lineage, but the branch to which Liguori belonged had become somewhat impoverished. You have overlooked a document which destroys your whole case." Saint Alphonsus Liguori's Story Moral theology, Vatican II said, should be more thoroughly nourished by Scripture, and show the nobility of the Christian vocation of the faithful and their obligation to bring forth fruit in charity for the life of the world. 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. Preaching, Eugene Grimm ed., Benziger Brothers, New York, 1887, Liguori, Alphonsus. St. Alphonsus encouraged an intimate, personal relationship with Jesus Christ through frequent visits to the Blessed Sacrament. 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. [5], A gifted musician and composer, he wrote many popular hymns and taught them to the people in parish missions. Still it must in fairness be admitted that all priests are not great theologians able to estimate intrinsic probability at its true worth, and the Church herself might be held to have conceded something to pure probabilism by the unprecedented honours she paid to the Saint in her Decree of 22 July, 1831, which allows confessors to follow any of St. Alphonsus's own opinions without weighing the reasons on which they were based. . About three years before his death he went through a veritable "Night of the Soul". My email address is webmaster at newadvent.org. Alphonsus was preaching missions in the rural areas and writing. Alphonsus Liguori, CSsR (27 September 1696 1 August 1787), sometimes called Alphonsus Maria de Liguori or Saint Alphonsus Liguori, was an Italian Catholic bishop, spiritual writer, composer, musician, artist, poet, lawyer, scholastic philosopher, and theologian. Omissions? All materials contained on this site, whether written, audible or visual are the exclusive property of Catholic Online and are protected under U.S. and International copyright laws, Copyright 2022 Catholic Online. Let's start with the saint. While the continual intensity of reiterated acts of virtue which we have called driving-power is what really creates sanctity, there is another indispensable quality. To this altered Rule or "Regolamento", as it came to be called, the unsuspecting Saint was induced to put his signature. His spirituality was both affective and active, centered above all on the Passion of Jesus Christ as the principal sign of our Savior's love for us. The Saint had four houses, but during his lifetime it not only became impossible in the Kingdom of Naples to get any more, but even the barest toleration for those he had could scarcely be obtained. Clarence F. Galli. SVO), gives an extremely full and picturesque account of the Saint's life and times. His austerities were rigorous, and he suffered daily the pain from rheumatism that was beginning to deform his body. Saint Alphonsus Maria de' Liguori, C.Ss.R. His very confessor and vicar general in the government of his Order, Father Andrew Villani, joined in the conspiracy. But, before relating the episode of the "Regolamento", as it is called, we must speak of the period of the Saint's episcopate which intervened. He submitted the new Rule to a number of theologians, who approved of it, and said it might be adopted in the convent of Scala, provided the community would accept it. He was more concerned with the spiritual conflict which was going on at the same time. On 3 October, 1731, the eve of the feast of St. Francis, she saw Our Lord with St. Francis on His right hand and a priest on His left. Quite recently, a duet composed by him, between the Soul and God, was found in the British Museum bearing the date 1760 and containing a correction in his own handwriting. In 1732, while he was staying at the Convent of the Consolation, one of his order's houses in the small city of Deliceto in the province of Foggia in Southeastern Italy, Liguori wrote the Italian carol "Tu scendi dalle stelle" ("From Starry Skies Descending") in the musical style of a pastorale. Beatified: September 15, 1816. The saints are not inhuman but real men of flesh and blood, however much some hagiographers may ignore the fact. As it was, he was refused the royal exequatur to the Brief of Benedict XIV, and State recognition of his Institute as a religious congregation till the day of his death. His own prayer was perhaps for the most part what some call "active", others "ordinary", contemplation. [10] He tried to refuse the appointment by using his age and infirmities as arguments against his consecration. St. Alphonsus Liguori. 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. This was in 1780, when Alphonsus was eighty-three years old. Revelations from God, the Saints, and the Angels through the Miracle of Saint Joseph, started in 1967 and continuing to this day. 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. The family was an old and noble one, though the branch to which the Saint belonged had become somewhat impoverished. [19], His Mariology, though mainly pastoral in nature, rediscovered, integrated and defended that of St Augustine of Hippo, St Ambrose of Milan and other fathers; it represented an intellectual defence of Mariology in the 18th century, the Age of Enlightenment, against the rationalism to which contrasted his fervent Marian devotion.[20]. He opposed sterile legalism and strict rigourism. 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. The Fathers in the Papal States, with too precipitate zeal, in the very beginning denounced the change of Rule to Rome. There was a considerable difference in age between the two men, for Falcoia, born in 1663, was now sixty-six, and Alphonsus only thirty-three, but the old priest and the young had kindred souls. Yet, to take anger alone, though comparatively early in life he seemed dead to insult or injury which affected himself, in cases of cruelty, or of injustice to others, or of dishonour to God, he showed a prophet's indignation even in old age. A final attempt to gain the royal approval, which seemed as if at last it had been successful, led to the crowning sorrow of Alphonsus's life: the division and apparent ruin of his Congregation and the displeasure of the Holy See. March 1, 1907. Three years later he published the first sketch of his "Moral Theology" in a single quarto volume called "Annotations to Busembaum", a celebrated Jesuit moral theologian. At the time of his death, there were 72, with over 10,000 active participants. His masterpiece was The Moral Theology (1748), which was approved by the Pope himself[5] and was born of Liguori's pastoral experience, his ability to respond to the practical questions posed by the faithful and his contact with their everyday problems. Cavalieri, himself a great servant of God. Saint Alphonsus Liguori; Revelation Delivered Through Frances Marie Klug Even its Rule was made known to her. It has a tendency at every moment to deflect, and if it does deflect from the right path, the greater the momentum the more terrible the final crash. 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. In vain those around him and even the judge on the bench tried to console him. He was beatified in 1816 and canonized in 1839. He called his system Equiprobabilism. He was also a poet and musician. St. Alphonsus does not offer as much directly to the student of mystical theology as do some contemplative saints who have led more retired lives. It was approved by the king and forced upon the stupefied Congregation by the whole power of the State. "St. Alphonsus Liguori." He was buried at the monastery of the Pagani near Naples. Ecclesiastical approbation. at last came peace, and on 1 August, 1787, as the midday Angelus was ringing, the Saint passed peacefully to his reward. A prolific writer, he published nine editions of his Moral Theology in his lifetime, in addition to other devotional and ascetic works and letters. St. Alphonsus appeared a miracle of calm to Tannoia. 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. By AClarke625. The German life, DILGSKRON, Leben des heiligen Bischofs und Kirchenlehrers, Alfonsus Maria de Liguori (New York, 1887), is scholarly and accurate. Whenthey had withdrawn into another room, the appearance of the youth changed, and Heshowed Himself crowned with thorns, His flesh torn, and said to her: Prayers in Times of Sickness Disease & Danger, True Devotion to Mary (St. Louis de Montfort), The Glories of Mary (St. Alphonsus Liguori), A young nobleman was reading one day, while at sea, an obscene book, in which he. Then God called him to his life work.
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