THIS day we celebrate one of the most remarkable feasts in the Calendar. We commemorate a saint who gained the heavenly crown by prayers indeed and tears, by sleepless nights and weary wanderings, but not in the administration of any high office in the Church, not in the fulfilment of some great resolution or special counsel; not as a preacher, teacher, evangelist, reformer, or champion of the faith; not as Bishop of the flock, or temporal govornor; not by eloquence, by wisdom, or by controversial success; not in the way of any other saint whom we invoke in the circle of the year; but as a mother, seeking and gaining by her penances the conversion of her son. It was for no ordinary son that she prayed, and it was no ordinary supplication by which she gained him. When a holy man saw its vehemence, ere it was successful, he said to her, “Go in peace; the son of such prayers cannot perish”. The prediction, was fulfilled beyond its letter; not only was that young man converted, but after his conversion he became a saint; not only a saint but a doctor also, and “instructed many unto justice”. Aeterna Press