Readings & Reflections: Saturday of the Seventh Week in Ordinary Time & St. Philip Neri, May 26,2018

Philip has been called the “Second Apostle of Rome,” after the great Saint Paul. Born in Florence, he lived for a time in his youth near Monte Cassino and drank deeply of the Benedictine life of prayer. He was ordained a priest at the age of thirty-five. By degrees, he took Rome by storm. He healed thousands in the confessional. He comforted and directed countless others. He gathered his followers for the Oratory – meetings that combined prayer and music, ending with almsgiving or pilgrimage to Rome’s basilicas. He received many mystical graces, the most telling of which was a mystical “enlargement” of his heart, which he described as being ignited with God’s own Spirit. He founded a Congregation of priests to support the work of the Oratory. Philip died in 1595 A.D. and was immediately proclaimed a saint by the Romans. read more