A prince known for his sense of justice and for his purity

St Casimir (1461-1484) was a prince who is now the principal patron saint of Lithuania and also a patron of Poland. The reading from the Office of Readings for his feast, which in Lent is observed as a commemoration, in other words it is optional, taken from a life of the saint, 'written by a close contemporary', highlights some of this young man's deeply Christian qualities.

• He dedicated himself completely and entirely to Christ's poor, to the pilgrims, the sick, the prisoners,and to all in distress.
• To widows, orphans and the oppressed, he was not only a protector and defender, but a father, son and brother.
• Nor is it possible to tell or even imagine the extent to which he promoted justice and exercised temperance, or the prudence with which he was endowed, or the strength and constancy of is character, and that in an age of permissiveness, when men were very much inclined to fall into evil ways . . .
• Day by day her urged his father to rule the kingdom and the subject peoples with justice . . .
• He took up the causes of the poor and wretched, and followed them up as if they were his own. Because of this the people called him the defender of the poor . . .
• It was always his preference to mix with the poor and the weak . . .
• He never sought the power which belongs to men of the highest rank . . .
• We have the word of important and trustworthy men, who were close to him and in whom he confided, that he lived as a virgin all his life, and died a virgin.

We have elections here in the Philippines in May for everything from the presidency down to local councillors. It is difficult to find evidence of the virtues of St Casimir among the candidates for the major offices. A convicted but unrepentant plunderer, who has never served a day in prison for his crimes, who uses a false name and was pardoned by President Gloria Arroyo, who succeeded him when he was deposed, is running for president again. Three of the Marcos family, who destroyed the Philippines during the Marcos dictatorship, are running for office and the 84-year-old president of the Senate, the architect of Marcos's Martial Law and who tried to bring the scouting movement directly under the control of the military in 1985, is running again for the senate.

One of the things that happened during Martial Law was the forced sterilisation of many women after they gave birth in government hospitals. The Population Commission at the time was pushing a very aggressive population control programme at the time. It was widely believed that each government hospital had a quota of sterilisations that they were expected to meet. Husbands weren't consulted and wives often made decisions that they later regretted because they were under pressure from those who should have been taking care of them.

On the other hand, government doctors and nurses are poorly paid. Today, many fully qualified nurses who cannot afford to go overseas where they will get jobs with decent pay, often have to offer their services as 'volunteers' in government hospitals.

There is no question that many Filipinos have a strong Catholic faith. Many died during the Martial Law years in witness to that. But there is a woeful absence of a sense of  the justice the Gospel demands, especially when it concerns the poor and the good of the wider community, as shown in the Human Face column of Ma. Ceres P Doyo (photo) in today's Philippine Daily Inquirer, Confessions of a highwayman. You can also find the article on Ceres' own blog, Human Face by Ceres. Ceres is one of the best journalists in the Philippines.

St Maria Teresa Goretti

I remember when I was seven my mother bringing me to the Capuchin church, Our Lady of the Angels, in Church St, Dublin, way back in 1950. It was the day that St Maria Goretti was canonised. In those days there were no afternoon or evening Masses, so the ceremony, as I recall it, ended with Benediction of the Blessed Sacrament. But what I remember most vividly, because I did not appreicate it at the time, was the recitation of the 15 mysteries of the rosary, the first time I had experienced that. Now there are 20, with the addition of the Mysteries of Light.

There were two extraordinary things about the canonisation of Maria. One was the presence of her mother, the first time this had ever happened at such a ceremony. The other was the presence of Alessandro Serenelli, the man who had tried to rape her and who then murdered her. He repented some years after the incident and asked for and received the forgiveness of Maria's mother. In his latter years he was a member of the Capuchin Third Order and lived with a community of friars. He died in 1970.

I have many friends who have found themselves in a situation similar to that of Maria Teresa, to give her her two baptismal names. She was born on 16 October 1890 and died on 6 July 1902. So she was a few months short of 12. Despite her lack of formal education she was well formed in the Catholic faith at home. Some of my young friends who have been violated, some of them small children, have had very little schooling.

In June 2007 a 13-year-old namesake of the saint, Maria Teresa Medrano, was raped and murdered in Bago City, just south of Bacolod City where I live. A few weeks later Mary Joy Mayo, 16, was brutally raped and slain in Talisay City, just north of Bacolod.

My Columban colleague in Olongapo City, Fr Shay Cullen, is dealing with situations like this all the time.

Today's gospel happened to be St Matthew's account of the cure of the woman with the haemorrhage and the raising from the dead of the 12-year-old daughter of Jairus. (I much prefer St Mark's far more vivid account which we had two Sundays ago). One of the characteristics of Jesus was that he gave importance to children in a society where they were 'seen and not heard'. I often heard when I was young that 'children should be seen and not heard', something I have never fully accepted. Indeed, one of the most gratifying things I was told by a friend of mine, now with her own large family, who told me when she was a young woman that she always appreciated the fact that when she was a child I took her seriously.

It is striking that God often chooses young people who are poor to remind us of his love for us. St Bernadette of Lourdes is a prime example, and the three children in Fatima.


There is a desperate need today to emphasise the importance of chastity and purity. These are virtues that are mocked and undermined, especially in Western societies. They are virtues that people have always had to struggle with but were recognised before, at least in Christian societies, as desirable. Today they are not. I believe that this has increased the level of unhappiness and violence in the world. The number of abortions, both legal and illegal, has soared. And when deaths related to pregnancy are cited there is usually no inclusion of the children who have been killed. The number of marriages and families breaking up has soared.

Yesterday I came across the website of Pure in Heart, 'an Irish youth community dedicated to living the true beauty of sexuality'. Thanks to Father Gerard Dunne OP for the link on his Irish Dominican Vocations. Young people are attracted to what is good, not to what is bad. They may be seduced by the latter but what touches their hearts and their idealism is what is from God. Pope John Paul II recognised that on the centennial of the death of the saint. And it's not only young people. One of the most awful aspects of the abuse of children by adults, especially priests and religious, is the destruction of trust, the destruction of innocence.

May St Maria Teresa Goretti - it has just struck me now that she must have been given the name 'Teresa' because she was born the day after the feast of the great Carmelite saint of Avila - obtain for our young people, boys and girls, the grace of a deep appreciation of who they are and of the importance of self-respect and of respect for others.

A Poem of Purity: Blessed Laura Vicuña

Today is the feast of Blessed Laura Vicuña, a 12-year-old girl born in Chile on 5 April 1891 who died on this day in Argentina in 1904. I came across this article, by Fr John Murray, a parish priest in Belfast, in the Irish Messenger of the Sacred Heart and got permission to use it in Misyon. We printed it in January-February last year, our second-last printed issue.

Blessed Laura’s feast isn’t on the universal calendar of the Church but she is especially venerated by Salesians. The day before, 21 January, is the feast of another girl around the same age, St Agnes. I regularly celebrate Mass in Holy Family Home here in Bacolod, featured in the current issue of Misyon as A Safe Haven and last July-August as ‘A Child Redeemed is a Generation Saved’ . Some of the girls there can relate to the experience of Blessed Laura and so last year we had a combined celebration of both of these saintly young girls. We celebrated Mass in their honour again last evening.

The reality of two young women offering their lives for others out of their faith in Jesus, St Agnes as a martyr and Blessed Laura offering her life for the conversion of her mother, can speak to the heart of anyone open to the Gospel and is Good News for young persons who have suffered deeply. Our suffering doesn’t have to be useless or meaningless. The words of St Paul in Col 1:24 once hit my heart like an arrow straight from Jesus himself: Now I rejoice in my sufferings for your sake, and in my flesh I complete what is lacking in Christ's afflictions for the sake of his body, that is, the church. The lives and deaths of Agnes and Laura show the truth of this.

http://www.lauravicuna.com/ is the website of the Laura Vicuna Foundation, Inc, Manila.