November 13th - St. Stanislaus Kostka

Program

Hagiography and Meditations

St. Stanislas Kostka

November 13. - St. Stanislas Kostka

St. Stanislas was of a noble Polish family. At the age of fourteen he went with his elder brother Paul to the Jesuits’ College at Vienna; and though Stanislas was ever bright and sweet-tempered, his austerities were felt as a reproach by Paul, who shamefully maltreated him. This ill-usage and his own penances brought on a dangerous illness, and, being in a Lutheran house, he was unable to send for a priest. He now remembered to have read of his patroness, St. Barbara, that she never permitted her clients to die without the Holy Viaticum: he devoutly appealed to her aid, and she appeared with two angels, who gave him the Sacred Host. He was cured of this illness by Our Lady herself, and was bidden by her to enter the Society of Jesus. To avoid his father's opposition, he was obliged to fly from Vienna; and, having proved his constancy by cheerfully performing the most menial offices, he was admitted to the novitiate at Rome. There he lived for ten short months marked by a rare piety, obedience, and devotion to his institute. He died, as he had prayed to die, on the feast of the Assumption, 1568, at the age of seventeen.

Reflection: St. Stanislas teaches us in every trial of life, and above all in the hour of death, to have recourse to our patron Saint, and to trust without fear to his aid.

(Butler's Lives of the Saints)

At Rome, [in the year 1568,] the holy Polish Confessor Stanislaus Kostka, of the Society of Jesus, who was made perfect in a little while and finished the work of many years in angelic innocency of life, and whose name the Supreme Pontiff Benedict XIII enrolled among those of the Saints.

(Roman Martyrology, 15th August)

Summary of the Morrow’s Meditation.

We will meditate tomorrow upon this angelic young man, who died at the age of eighteen, and who in such a short space of time won so beautiful a place in heaven. We will consider that he was: 1st, an angel through his love; 2d, a martyr by his abnegation. We will thence deduce the resolution : 1st, to strive every day to in crease holy love within us by frequent aspirations of love and by ardent desires to love God more and more ; 2d, to prove our love to Jesus Christ by making in a cheerful spirit all the sacrifices or acts of abnegation for which opportunities may occur. Our spiritual nosegay shall be the words which the Holy Scriptures apply to the just man : "Being made perfect in a short space, he fulfilled a long time" (Wis. iv. 13).

Meditation for the Morning.

Let us adore the Holy Spirit taking possession of the heart of Stanislaus Kostka whilst he was still a child, and from that time embellishing him with angelic purity, turning his affections from earth and raising them all towards heaven, filling him with divine strength to conquer himself, and setting him on fire with love for God alone. Let us praise and glorify the Holy Spirit for this marvel of grace, and let us beg Him to have pity on our miseries and to convert us.

St. Stanislaus Kostka was an Angel through his Love for God.

Such was the love with which St. Stanislaus burned for God that it raised him above all visible things, which were as nothing- to him, and made him concentrate all his affections in God alone. As soon as he began his mental prayer his mind and his heart were absorbed in God, and he did not know what it was to have distractions. His face became inflamed, tears of love flowed from his eyes ; such an ardor of charity burned in his breast that he could not bear its flames, and he was obliged to temper them by means of cold water. When not engaged in prayer, in the whole course of his actions, his heart was never separated from God ; he did everything in union with God and through love for God. I was not born for the things of this present world," he said, “but for those which are for the future and eternal." Therefore his life was that of a wholly heavenly soul. In church and when he was praying he manifested a recollection which deeply impressed all who were witnesses of it ; outside the church he showed a modesty which revealed how entirely united was his interior with God ; in conversation he spoke the language of heaven, and people thought that they were listening to a seraphim. The spectacle of the sins committed upon earth filled his heart with grief, and he was often seen spending as much as five or six hours on his knees, with his arms stretched out, his eyes bathed in tears, to ask God to pardon the offences committed against His adorable majesty, and to make Him honorable amends by offering himself as an expiatory victim for all the iniquities of the world. He even felt a great disgust for life, and sighed with inexpressible ardor for heaven, where God is no longer offended, where He is always loved, and where He is seen to be always loved. O God, inspire our hearts with the same sentiments ! When will the beautiful day which knows no night dawn for me, because Thou art therein no longer offended ? When shall I enter into the country where chanty unites all hearts ? (Brev. Paris, Hymn Complet.) Thou delayest too long, O day so greatly desired ! Oh, how gladly would I leave the prison of my body in order to enter the beautiful heaven where I shall not cease to contemplate Thee, O my God, and to sing Thy praises ! (Brev. Paris, Hymn Vesp. Domin.).

St. Stanislaus Kostka was a Martyr by his Abnegation

As this holy young man was very agreeable to God, it was necessary he should pass through the crucible of tribulation (Tob. xii. 13). From his earliest infancy he subjected himself to privations and to a life of austerity in the midst of all the comforts of which his paternal home was full. Sent to Vienna for his studies in the company of his brother, he found a persecutor in his very brother, who could not bear his recollected life, separated from the pleasures and amusements of the world, his long hours of prayer, the whole of his angelic life, which was such a notable condemnation of the dissipated worldly life he himself led. Not content with persecuting this earthly angel, he stirred up his companions against him and made him odious to them. They all vied with each other in persecuting him with bitter satire and with insulting speeches ; they even went so far as to strike him and heap upon him the worst kind of treatment. During the space of two years the holy young man bore this martyrdom without complaint or murmur, without meeting it with anything but patience, gentleness, and amiability. Called to the Society of Jesus by the Blessed Virgin, who appeared to him, but wanting resources to pay the expenses of the journey because of the opposition his father made to his vocation, he did not hesitate to go five hundred leagues on foot, wearing a poor garment and asking alms ; and having reached Rome and arrived at the Novitiate of the Society, he submitted himself joyfully to all the austerities of his new life. He followed the rule with a strictness which admitted of neither exception nor dispensation ; he was content to live in a continual immolation of his own will, founded upon the principle that it is better to do little things through obedience than great ones in following our own will. He saw in his rule or in his superiors the will of God, and lovingly following this holy will, he rose from virtue to virtue, and was the admiration of his masters as well as of his companions. Soon he was ripe for heaven, and death came to add another angel and another martyr to the heavenly court. May I profit by this beautiful example, and comprehend that we cannot go to heaven without passing through suffering and tribulation.

Resolutions and spiritual nosegay as above.