Step back in time and experience the realities of medieval life. In this long-form medieval history compilation, Jason Kingsley CBE, the Modern Knight, explores what everyday life was really like during the Middle Ages, bringing together hours of historical research, practical demonstrations, and insights into the lives of ordinary people. From peasants and farmers to knights, castles, clothing, food, travel, work, and daily survival, discover how medieval men, women, and children lived in a world very different from our own.
Forget the myths and fantasy stereotypes this video focuses on genuine medieval history, drawing on historical sources, archaeological evidence, and hands-on experience to recreate life in the Middle Ages as accurately as possible.
Whether you're interested in medieval England, castles, knights, peasant life, historical clothing, medieval food, or simply enjoy relaxing educational content, this compilation offers an immersive journey into the medieval world.
Topics featured include: Medieval daily life, Peasants and farmers, Medieval clothing and fashion, Food and cooking in the Middle Ages, Medieval work and occupations, Village life and communities as well as Customs, traditions, and beliefs
04 November 2026
Traditional Catholic Morning Prayers in English | November
Our Freemasonic World
From I Miss Christendom
The world today is much different than at any other time in human history.
Throughout human history, most societies were structured with a monarchical form of Government and a common religion as the guiding force of that government and its people.
Concepts such as freedom of religion, freedom of speech and freedom of expression were basically non-existent.
Of course, this is such a foreign concept to us today that we feel it must have been a thousand years ago. But in reality it was only a few generations ago.
In fact, this was the case throughout Europe and the rest of the world until the later part of the 19th through the middle of the 20th centuries.
When a series of revolutions and wars toppled the long-standing royal houses, setting up Democratic republics in their place.
We are told that this all happened naturally. That the people rose up against these oppressive dynasties.
But the reality is this was done by a behind-the-scenes organisation called Freemasonry.
A Leader of the Real Reformation, Charles Borromeo Saw a Need and Filled It
Today is his Feast Day. He was a leader of the true Reformation, the counter to the protestant revolt that destroyed what had been Christendom.
From Aleteia
By Nicholas Senz
His example shows us the way to call the Church back to its true self, rather than splitting and splintering it.
Five hundred years after Martin Luther nailed his 95 Theses to the church door in Wittenberg, the word “reformation” has become synonymous with Protestantism. When we speak of “the reformers,” we typically mean people like Luther, John Calvin, or Ulrich Zwingli. Yet too often we forget about another reformation, a Catholic Reformation, that helped to cure the Church of some of its late-medieval ills rather than amputate its limbs. And one of its great figures, St. Charles Borromeo, is commemorated November 4.
Many aspects of the Church in the year 1517 were not healthy. The clergy were generally ill-educated and often failed to live up to the moral standards their state in life requires. Prelates essentially bribed the papacy for appointments to plum dioceses, which they would then tax but not reside in or oversee in any meaningful way. And the understanding of the relation between money and indulgences had slipped down the slope from a form of almsgiving to, in some places, essentially buying one’s way into heaven. The faith of many of the laity bordered on superstition, but the clergy were too ill-equipped or too little interested to properly teach them.
The Protestants saw this situation and denounced the Church, first in its practices, then in its teachings, ultimately either leaving or being expelled, splintering the Church into factions. Far from a reform, this was a revolt, which only exacerbated rather than alleviated the Church’s problems.
The Church responded to these challenges by calling an ecumenical council at Trent, but the initial sessions were sporadic. When Pope Pius IV was elected, he appointed his 22-year-old nephew, Charles Borromeo, as cardinal, and brought him to Rome to assist in the Curia. Despite his youth, Charles had already received degrees in both civil and canon law. He organized the third and final convocation of the Council of Trent and oversaw the production of the Roman Catechism, which was the standard universal catechism for more than 400 years and became an invaluable tool for teaching the faith.
Charles continued his reforming efforts after he was made archbishop of Milan, particularly focusing on education. Charles recognized that many of the ills of the Church were due to poor education of both clergy and laity. So he founded seminaries and colleges both in his archdiocese and throughout Europe for the intellectual and spiritual formation of the clergy, and he established the Confraternity of Christian Doctrine (the famous CCD) for the religious education of children. Charles’ legacy in this area is such that he is remembered today as a patron saint of catechesis.
But he was not only focused on the intellectual life of his flock—he fed their mouths as well as their minds. He was a patron of the poor, taking on great personal debt to feed the hungry during times of famine and hardship. When Milan was struck by plague and the city’s governor and nobles left, Charles remained to organize the care of the sick.
Charles’ personal holiness and spiritual leadership helped revivify the Church. Though his strict responses to an age of laxity earned him many enemies in his day, a sterling legacy emerged. Charles’ commitment to sound catechetical learning and solid priestly formation produced a laity and clergy with a much deeper grounding in the Catholic faith, less prone to the vices of superstition and greed that plagued the Church of his time.
As St. Augustine famously said, the Church is semper reformanda—always in need of reform. Thankfully, we have great examples like St. Charles Borromeo to show us the way to call the Church back to its true self, rather than splitting and splintering it—to have reform, and not revolt.
Learn more about how art was a key part of the Church’s response to the Protestant revolution with this series of articles from art historian Elizabeth Lev. See the series here: Art and Reformation.
03 November 2026
Christian Politics: Origins of the Two Swords Dogma
All of truly Christian politics is based on Famuli Vestrae Pietatis, (quoted below), written by Pope Gelasius I to Emperor Anastasius I Dicorus.
From One Peter Five
By Timothy Flanders, MA
"There are two swords, august Emperor, by which this world is chiefly ruled."
Editor’s note: this is an excerpt from the author’s book City of God vs. City of Man: the Battles of the Church from Antiquity to the Present. See also the following two selections for origins of Christian politics before the annunciation of the Two Swords dogma.
The Bishop’s Altar is the Throne of Christ the King in every City-State-Nation
The King of Kings over Rome and All Nations
Two Swords Crusade for the City of God
The first prolonged schism between east and west happened when the Emperor Zeno attempted to impose a compromise with truth, the henotikon, which attempted to reconcile the supporters of Chalcedon with its opponents. For this, the pope excommunicated all who held this doctrine. This was the Acacian schism (484-519).
Pope Gelasius wrote to the emperor saying that the demons had inspired the pagan emperors to assume the title pontifex maximus.[1] He enunciated the foundation of the covenant for Christian peoples:
There are two swords, august Emperor, by which this world is chiefly ruled, namely, the sacred authority of the priests and the royal power. Of these that of the priests is the more weighty, since they have to render an account for even the kings of men in the divine judgment. You are also aware, dear son, that while you are permitted honorably to rule over human kind, yet in things divine bow your head humbly before the leaders of the clergy and await from their hands the means of your salvation. In the reception and proper disposition of the heavenly mysteries you recognize that you should be subordinate rather than superior to the religious order, and that in these matters you depend on their judgment rather than wish to force them to follow your will.[2]
The two swords were meant to work together, each in its own proper sphere, to baptize all of society and make a Christian people.
This is what the saints, our fathers had instinctively followed in Armenia, Georgia, Ethiopia, Ireland and at this time, France, where king Clovis was baptized during this schism. The king must rule according to the cultus as determined by the elders of Christian culture. Yet between king and bishop there exists an organic mutual aid. Just as body and soul are united in one person, so the two swords are united in one body politic. This was the proper ordering of Christian culture and peoples. In theory, the east agreed, but in practice, the Roman emperor was pontifex maximus, deposing bishops at will, rearranging the cultus to serve his ends.[3] This was in imitation of Cain and the rabbis who imposed their will on cultus.
Because of this, over the course of 464 years from Constantine (323) to the Seventh Ecumenical Council (787), the eastern bishops would hold heretical doctrines and be out of communion with Rome for at least 203 years.[4] These were the schismatic Greeks, while the orthodox Greeks chose to suffer or flee to the west.
The emperor did not listen to the pope in the Acacian schism, and in 516, he continued to style himself pontifex.[5] The central question was this: who is the pontifex maximus, the high priest: the emperor or the pope? It was true that the Roman emperor held a relationship with the bishops that was sacred, but in what sense could he be said to have a priesthood?
Justinian’s Crusade for the Earthly City
The Acacian schism was ended in 519 when a new dynasty conceded the Petrine primacy of “Roman doctrinal prestige” and imposed this on all the eastern bishops.[6] Justinian came to the imperial throne in 527 with his wife, the powerful Theodora, who grew up from prostitution to become the Christian Augusta. Would she be an Artemesian Eudoxia or a Marian Pulcheria?
Dawson says Theodora “fascinated and subdued” Justinian who, according to his contemporary critic Procopius, “overturned the social order” by failing in masculinity and letting his wife dominate.[7] Indeed he himself codified the Two Swords doctrine yet in a way that left open the question of whether he remained in some sense the pontifex maximus.[8]
A sympathetic reading sees his whole reign as an attempt at “the deliberate restoration of the ancient Roman empire” now Christianized.[9] That meant conquest and monuments. Justinian did not lead his army in battle but sent his generals to fight wars with Persia (527-532, 540-562). The Christians under Persia were not only recovering from an internal schism over the sons of Syriac bishops but also, under St. Aba the Great, spreading the Gospel east of the Persian empire and south to modern Yemen and Socotra.[10]
But while the Syriacs were conquering with the Gospel, Justinian was conquering the west with a brutal twenty-year campaign in north Africa and Italy (535-554). This restored most of the borders of Caesar’s empire, allowing his top general Belasarius to celebrate a Christianized rite of triumph in 553.[11]
In his decrees, Justinian celebrated that by his conquests the Persians were made “quiet,” the barbarian Vandals and Moors were made “obedient,” the western Romans “have recovered their former freedom” and “the Tzani [barbarians] have, for the first time, been subjected to Roman domination (which is something that God had not permitted to take place up to this time and until Our reign).”[12] A new Virgil composed a Latin epic poem about the conquests.[13] Meanwhile, the local Roman populace of Italia suffered with the loss of land and souls under the decades of bloodshed.
Justinian imposed punishing taxes on the populace that allowed him to build great building like the hippodrome. But his strict rule, taxes and corrupt bureaucracy, exacerbated the economic and religious tensions. This led to the brutal Nika riots, which burned down much of Constantinople, destroying the Theodosian Hagia Sophia. Justinian was considering running away when Theodora told him in the presence of the Roman senate, “may I never be separated from this [royal] purple, and may I not live that day on which those who meet me shall not address me as mistress” proclaiming that she would rather die in her royal garments than flee.[14] He then killed 30,000 civilians and put down the riots.[15]
Immediately he began to rebuild Hagia Sophia greater and more excellent than ever before. This seems to have become the Christianized triumph arch to cement himself as pontifex maximus presiding over the holy city of New Rome and the sacred empire. Theodora also received a halo in the mosaics of the time. Like Caesar Augustus, Justinian’s propaganda made it seem like “the hidden influence of God” was made “to support the self-assured brilliance of the emperor.”[16]
While this was being built, in 535 Justinian named the city Justiniana Prima after himself and attempted to exalt its bishop’s authority.[17] Missionary activity was closely linked to forming diplomatic alliances to the earthly city.[18]
While Justinian’s wife may not have understood the terminology, she “was emotionally deeply committed to the [Alexandrian] cause.”[19] Even though in theory Justinian believed in the Petrine primacy of pope and bishops, he proved he still saw himself as pontifex by devising a doctrinal compromise between the Antiochian and Alexandrian factions.
For a time he sponsored true dialogos between the parties, but he soon took matters into his own hands.[20] His plan was to suppress some of the terms of the Fathers and then condemn Theodore Mopsuestia to appease the Alexandrians and his wife. [21] The problem was the Petrine authority. Therefore, Meyendorff admits that Theodora “groomed” Vigilius to be pope and extracted a promise to follow the Imperial program of compromise once “elected.”[22] Theodora worked with the wife of the general Belasarius and got him to depose Pope St. Silverius, who died in exile from harsh treatment, and appoint Vigilius instead.[23]
At the same time, Theodora also appointed a parallel hierarchy for the Alexandrians known as the “Jacobites.” This hierarchy elected a new bishop of Alexandria, Theodosius I, whom Justinian himself later deposed.[24] Before this, most faithful simply communed with the local bishop. But the actions of Theodora “led to a permanent schism.”[25]
Then in 543 God sent a severe plague that afflicted, according to one contemporary “the whole world” and left cities “altogether depopulated.”[26] Modern estimates range from 15-100 million dead.[27] It is still called the “Plague of Justinian” to this day. Procopius said this wrath was for Justinian’s brutal taxes and persecution, while Alexandrian John of Ephesus said it was “not only a sign of threat and of wrath, but also a sign of grace and a call to repentance.”[28] In fact, the emperor himself was struck with this plague. In 548, Theodora went to her eternal reward. The Alexandrian Oriental Orthodox venerate her as a saint.
The plague and the death of Theodora seem to have only galvanized his zeal to impose his doctrine as pontifex maximus, seemingly to appease God’s wrath. He called on Pope Vigilius, therefore to keep up his bargain and support the imperial doctrine. But the grace of office proved to give Vigilius back his crusading spirit, and Justinian had to resort to violent coercion to force the pope to sign the “conciliar unanimity” of the Fifth Ecumenical Council, provoking another schism with the west.[29]
Shortly thereafter an earthquake rocked the east, and even parts of Hagia Sophia collapsed. Justinian instituted a service of supplication every year to commemorate the earthquake, and told the city that the immorality of the citizens had caused God’s wrath.[30] He then “employed drastic measures” of coercion to enforce the council. But after Theodora’s parallel hierarchy was set up, he now faced “the resistance of the masses led by ‘underground’ leaders, proud of their martyrdom and gradually beginning to identify their religious cause with cultural non-Greek and non-Roman identity of Syrians, Armenians, Arabs and Copts.”[31]
In 563, Justinian went on pilgrimage to the shrine of St. Michael in Germania seeking healing from the plague.[32] He then suddenly began imposing yet another new doctrine—aphthartodocetism, which proclaimed that Christ’s body was divine—and deposed his bishop of Constantinople for opposing it.
He died without establishing a lasting earthly city, nor a lasting peace for the heavenly, and his religious policy is seen by Meyendorff as a “failure.”[33] To the Imperial Greek Christians, he is officially “the great and glorious…holy emperor” yet there seems to be very little devotion to him.[34] The Copts condemn Justinian but praise Theodora, while the Roman martyrology does not commemorate either.[35] His successors attempted the same mixture of dialogos and violence with the same result. Then in 572, while the plague still raged, war broke out with Persia again. No doubt every pious soul cried out to the King of Kings for mercy.
[1] Cameron, “The Imperial Pontifex,” 362.
[2] Robinson, op. cit., 72-73.
[3] Alan Ryan, On Politics (New York: Liveright, 2012), vol. I, 215ff; Posnov, op. cit.,217.
[4] Monsignor L. Duchesne, The Churches Separated from Rome (Kegan Paul, 1907), 109.
[5] Cameron, op. cit., 363.
[6] Meyendorff (Imperial Unity, 212-216) admits this yet attempts to obviate the significance of the event.
[7] Dawson, The Making of Europe, 117; Leslie Brubaker, “The Age of Justinian: Gender and Society,” Michael Maas, ed., Cambridge Companion to the Age of Justinian (Cambridge, 2005), 433-436.
[8] Posnov, 215-217; Robert Browning, Justinian and Theodora, rev. ed., (London, Thames and Hudson: 1987) 61.
[9] Louth, “Justinian and His Legacy,” Cambridge History of the Byzantine Empire, 107.
[10] Baum and Winkler, op. cit., 33-34.
[11] Mary Beard, The Roman Triumph (Harvard University Press, 2009), 318-319.
[12] Novella I, preface, trans. S. P. Scott, The Civil Law, XVI, (Cincinnati, 1932) <https://droitromain.univ-grenoble-alpes.fr/Anglica/N1_Scott.htm>, accessed March 25, 2021.
[13] Johannis and De Bellis Libycis by Flavius Cresconius Corippus.
[14] Procopius, Wars 1.24, trans. H. B. Dewing (London: William Heinemann, 1914).
[15] Ibid.
[16] Rousseau, op. cit.,123-124.
[17] Posnov, op. cit.,245.
[18] Browning, op. cit.,62.
[19] Ibid.
[20] Meyendorff, op. cit., 222, 233-234, 236ff.
[21] Browning, 63.
[22] Meyendorff, op. cit.,227.
[23] J. P. Kirsch, “Pope St. Silverius,” Catholic Encyclopedia (1912) <https://www.newadvent.org/cathen/13793a.htm>, accessed March 26, 2021.
[24] Meyendorff, 256.
[25] Ibid., 228-230.
[26] Evagrius, Church History, bk IV, ch. 24. XXIX, trans. E. Walford (1846) <http://www.tertullian.org/fathers/evagrius_4_book4.htm>, accessed March 25, 2021.
[27] Lee Mordecha et. al., “The Justinianic Plague: An inconsequential pandemic?” Elsa M. Redmond, ed., Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences Dec 2019, 116 (51) 25546-25554; Thomas Maugh, “An Empire’s Epidemic,” Los Angeles Times (May 6, 2002), University of California Los Angeles School of Public Health <https://www.ph.ucla.edu/epi/bioter/anempiresepidemic.html>, accessed March 25, 2021; William Rosen, Justinian’s Flea: Plague, Empire, and the Birth of Europe (New York City: Viking Adult, 2007), 3.
[28] In Rosen, Justinian’s Flea excerpt, <http://www.justiniansflea.com/bio.htm>, accessed March 25, 2021.
[29] On the story of this schism, see Erick Ybarra, “Vigilius,” <https://erickybarra.org/?s=vigilius&submit=Search> and his forthcoming volume, The Papacy.
[30] Brian Croke, “Justinian’s Constantinople,” in Michael Maas, ed., The Cambridge Companion to the Age of Justinian,71.
[31] Meyendorff, 230.
[32] Peter Brown, The Rise of Western Christendom, 181.
[33] For a further sympathetic overview of his legacy, see Meyendorff, 245-250
[34] Prologue of Ohrid, November 14th, http://www.westsrbdio.org/prolog/my.html?month=November&day=14&Go.x=15&Go.y=7
[35] Ethiopian Synaxarion, St. Severus of Antioch, February 21(Yekatit 14).
St Charles, Bishop & Confessor, & Ss Vitalis & Agricola, Martyrs
From Dom Prosper Guéranger's Liturgical Year:
Humilitas. This word already stood, crowned with gold, upon his family escutcheon, when Charles was born at the castle of Arona. It had been said of the Borromeos that they knew nothing of humility, except to bear it on their coat of arms: but the time had now come, when the mysterious device was to be justified by the most illustrious scion of that noble family; and when, at the zenith of his greatness, a Borromeo would learn to void his heart of self, in order that God might fill it. Far, however, from abjuring the high-mindedness of his race, the humble Saint was the most intrepid of them all, while his enterprises were to eclipse the noble exploits of a long line of ancestors. One more proof that humility never debases.
Charles was scarcely twenty-two years of age when Pius IV, his maternal uncle, called him to the difficult post of Secretary of State, shortly afterwards created him Cardinal and Archbishop of Milan, and seemed to take pleasure in heaping honors and responsibilities on his young shoulders. The late Pontiff, Paul IV, had been ill requited for placing a similar confidence in his nephews the Caraffas, who ended their days upon the scaffold. His successor, on the contrary, as the event testified, was actuated by the inspiration of the Holy Ghost, not by the dictates of flesh and blood.
Sixty years of that fatal century had already elapsed, while the evils consequent on Luther’s revolt were ever increasing, and the Church was daily threatened with some new danger. The Protestants had just imposed upon the Catholics of Germany the treaty of Passau, which completed the triumph of the fanatics, and secured to them equality and liberty. The abdication of Charles V in despair left the empire to his brother Ferdinand; while Spain, with its immense dominions in both hemispheres, fell to his son Philip II. Ferdinand I inaugurated the custom of dispensing with Rome, by crowning himself with the diadem which St. Leo III had placed upon the brow of Charlemagne; and Philip, enclosing Italy by taking Naples in the South and Milan in the North, seemed to many to be threatening the independence of Rome herself. England, reconciled for a brief period under Mary Tudor, was replunged by Elizabeth into the schism which continues to the present day. Boy kings succeeded one another on the throne of St. Louis, and the regency of Catharine de Medici involved France in the wars of religion.
Such was the political situation which the minister of Pius IV had to cope with, and to utilize to the best of his power for the interests of the Holy See and of the Church. Charles did not hesitate. With faith to supply for his want of experience, he understood that to the torrent of errors, which threatened to deluge the world, Rome must first of all oppose, as an embankment, that undivided truth of which she is the guardian.
He saw how, in contest with a heresy, which claimed the name of Reformation while it let loose every passion, the Church might take occasion from the struggle to strengthen her discipline, elevate the morals of her children, and manifest to the eyes of all her indefectible sanctity. This thought had already, under Paul III and Julius III, led to the convocation of the Council of Trent, and inspired its dogmatic definitions and reformatory decrees. But the Council, twice interrupted, had not completed its work, which was still under dispute. It had now been suspended for eight years, and the difficulties in the way of its resumption continued to increase, on account of the quarrelsome pretensions of princes. The Cardinal-nephew bent all his efforts to surmount the obstacles. He devoted day and night to the work, imbuing with his views the Sovereign Pontiff himself, inspiring with his zeal the nuncios at the various courts, vying in skill and firmness with diplomatic ministers in order to overcome the prejudices or the ill will of monarch. And when, after two years of these difficult negotiations, the Fathers of Trent gathered together once more, Charles was the providence and the tutelary angel of this august assembly. To him it owed its material organization, its political security, the complete independence of its deliberations and their thenceforward uninterrupted continuity. Himself detained at Rome, he was the intermediary between the Pope and the Council. The presiding legates soon gave him their full confidence, as is proved from the pontifical archives; to him, as to the ablest counselor and most reliable support, they daily had recourse in their solicitudes and anxieties.
For her (wisdom’s) sake, says the Wise Man, I shall have glory among the multitude, and honor with the ancients, though I be young … and the faces of princes shall wonder at me. They shall wait for me when I hold my peace, and they shall look upon me when I speak, and if I talk much they shall lay their hands on their mouths. (Wisdom 8:10-12) Such was truly the case with St. Charles, at this critical moment of the world’s history. No wonder that divine Wisdom, to whom he listened with such docility, and who inspired him so copiously, rendered his name immortal in the memory of a grateful posterity.
In his Defense of the too famous Declaration, Bossuet, speaking of the Council of Trent which owed its completion to St. Charles, says that it brought the Church back to the purity of her origin, as far as the iniquity of the times would permit. (Gallia orthodoxa, Pars III., 6:13, 7:40) And when the ecumenical sessions at the Vatican were opened, the Bishop of Poitiers, the future Cardinal Pie, spoke of “that Council of Trent, which deserved, more truly even than that of Nicæa, to be called the great Council; that Council, concerning which we may confidently assert, that since the creation of the world no assembly of men has succeeded in introducing among mankind such great perfection; that Council whereof it has been said that, as a tree of life, it has forever restored to the Church the rigor of her youth. More than three centuries have elapsed since its labors were completed, and its healing and strengthening virtue is still felt.” (Discourse pronounced at Rome, in the Church of St Andrew della Valle Jan 14, 1870)
“The Council of Trent is perpetuated in the Church by means of the Roman Congregations charged with its continual application, and with ensuring obedience to the pontifical constitutions which have followed and completed it.” (Pastoral instruction on occasion of the approaching Council of Bordeaux, June 26, 1850) Charles suggested the measures adopted for this end by Pius IV, and approved and developed by succeeding Pontiffs. He caused the Liturgical Books to be revised, and the Roman Catechism to be compiled. But first, and in all things, he was himself the living model of his renewed discipline, and thus acquired the right to exercise his zeal for or against others. Rome, initiated by him in the salutary reform, of which it was fitting she should set the first example, was in a few months completely transformed. The three churches now dedicated to St. Charles within her walls, (St Charles at the Catinari, one of the most beautiful in Rome; St Charles on the Corso, which possesses his heart; St Charles at the four fountains.) and the numerous altars which bear his name in other sanctuaries of the holy City, are the testimony of her enduring gratitude.
His administration, however, and his sojourn in Rome lasted only during the six years of Pius IV’s pontificate. On the death of that Pope, in spite of the entreaties of Pius V, whose election was done chiefly to his exertions, Charles set out for Milan, which called for the presence of its Archbishop. For nigh a century, the great Lombard city had scarcely known its pastors save by name; and this abandonment had delivered it, like so many others at that period, to the wolf that catcheth and scattereth the sheep. Our Saint understood far otherwise the responsibility of the cure of souls. He gave himself entirely to this duty, without care for himself, without a thought for the judgments of men, without fear of the powerful. His maxim was: to treat of the interests of Jesus Christ in the spirit of Jesus Christ; (Acta Eccl. Mediolanensis, Oratio habita in Concil. prov 6) his program, the ordinances of Trent. Charles’s episcopate was the carrying out of the great Council; its living form, the model of its practical application in the whole Church, and the proof of its efficiency, demonstrating that it sufficed for every reform, and could, of itself alone, sanctify both pastor and flock.
We would gladly have given more than a passing notice of these Acts of the church of Milan, which have been lovingly collected by faithful hands, and which show our Saint in so grant a light. Herein, after the six provincial councils and eleven diocesan synods over which he presided, follows the inexhaustible series of general or special mandates dictated by his zeal; pastoral letters, the most remarkable of which is the sublime Memorial written after the plague in Milan; instructions upon the holy Liturgy, upon the tenure of churches, upon preaching, upon the administration of the Sacraments, and notably the celebrated instruction to Confessors; ordinances concerning the archiepiscopal court, the chancellorship, canonical visitations; regulations for the archbishop’s domestic family, and his vicars and officials of all ranks, for the parish priests and their meetings in conference (a custom introduced by him), for the Oblates he had founded, the seminaries, schools, and confraternities; edicts and decrees; and lastly various tables, and complete forms of administrative acts, so drawn up that nothing remains but to insert names and dates. It is a true pastoral encyclopedia which, in its magnificent amplitude, would appear to be the work of a long life, yet St. Charles died at the early age of forty-six; and moreover all this was written in the midst of trials and combats sufficient to have been his sole preoccupation.
But it is time to listen to the Church’s account of him.
Charles was born at Milan, of the noble family of Borromeo. His future pre-eminent sanctity was foreshown by a heavenly light shining at night over the room where he was born. He was enrolled in his boyhood in the ranks of the clergy, and soon provided with an Abbey; but he warned his father not to turn its revenues to private use; and as soon as its administration was entrusted to him, he spent all the surplus income on the poor. As a youth he pursued his liberal studies at Pavia. He had the greatest love for holy chastity; and several times put to flight, with the greatest firmness, some shameless women sent to tempt him. In the twenty-third year of his age, his uncle Pius IV created him Cardinal; and he adorned that dignity by his great piety and remarkable virtues. Being soon afterwards made Archbishop of Milan, he labored strenuously to carry out, in his whole diocese, the decrees of the Council of Trent, which had just been concluded mainly through his exertions. To reform the evil customs of his people he held many synods, and moreover was ever himself a perfect model of virtue. He also labored much to expel the heretics from Switzerland and the country of the Grisons, and converted many of them to the true faith.
The charity of this holy man was strikingly exhibited when he sold the principality of Oria, and in one day distributed the price, amounting to about forty thousand gold pieces, among the poor. With no less generosity he, on another occasion, distributed twenty thousand gold pieces left him as a legacy. He resigned the many ecclesiastical benefices which his uncle had bestowed upon him, except a few which he retained for his own necessities and for relieving the poor. When the plague was raging in Milan, he gave up the furniture of his house, even his bed, for the support of the poor, and thenceforward always slept on a bare board. He visited the plague-stricken with unwearied zeal, assisted them with fatherly affection, and, administering to them with his own hands the Sacraments of the Church, singularly consoled them. Meanwhile he approached to God in humble prayer as a mediator for his people; he ordered public supplications to be made, and himself walked in the processions, with a rope round his neck, his feet bare and bleeding from the stones, and carrying a cross; and thus offering himself as a victim for the sins of the people, he endeavored to turn away the anger of God. He strenuously defended the liberty of the Church, and was most zealous in restoring discipline. For this reason some seditious persons fired upon him while he was engaged in prayer, but by the divine power he was preserved unharmed.
His abstinence was wonderful: he very often fasted on bread and water, and sometimes took only a little pulse. He subdued his body by night-watchings, a rough hairshirt and frequent disciplines. He was a great lover of humility and meekness. Even when occupied by weighty business, he never omitted his prayer or preaching. He built many churches, monasteries and colleges. He wrote many works of great value especially for the instruction of bishops; and it was through his care that the catechism for parish priests was drawn up. At length he retired to a solitary place on Mount Varallo, where the mysteries of our Lord’s Passion are sculptured in a lifelike manner, and there after spending some days in severe bodily mortifications sweetened by meditation on Christ’s sufferings, he was seized by a fever. He returned to Milan; but the illness growing much worse, he was covered with sackcloth and ashes, and with his eyes fixed on the crucifix he passed to heaven, in the forty-seventh year of his age, on the third of the Nones of November, in the year of our Lord 1584. He was illustrated by miracles, and was enrolled among the Saints by Pope Paul V.
Successor of Ambrose, thou didst inherit his zeal for the house of God; thy action also was powerful in the Church; and though separated in time by a thousand years, your names are now united in one common glory. May your prayers also mingle before the throne of God for us in these times of decadence; and may your power in heaven obtain for us pastors worthy to continue, or if need be to renew, your work on earth. How obviously applicable to both of you were those words of Holy Writ: What manner of man the ruler of the city is, such also are they that dwell therein. (Ecclesiasticus 10:2) And again: I will fill the soul of the priests with fatness; and my people shall be filled with my good things, saith the Lord. (Jeremiah 31:14)
Rightly didst thou say, O Charles: “Never did Israel hear a more awful threat than this: Lex peribit a sacerdote. (The law shall perish.) (Ezekiel 7:26) Priests are divine instruments, upon whom depends the welfare of the world; their abundance is the riches of all, their default is the ruin of nations.” (Concio 1 ad. clerum, in synod. diæces xi)
And when, from the midst of thy priests convoked in synod, thou didst pass to the venerable assembly of seventeen bishops thy suffragens, thy language became, if possible, still more vehement: “Let us fear lest the angered Judge say to us: If you were the enlighteners of my Church, why have you closed your eyes? If you pretended to be shepherds of the flock, why have you suffered it to stray? Salt of the earth, you have lost your savor. Light of the world, they that sat in darkness and the shadow of death have never seen you shine. You were Apostles; who, then, put your apostolic firmness to the test, since you have done nothing but seek to please men? You were the mouth of the Lord, and you have made that mouth dumb. If you allege in excuse that the burden was beyond your strength, why did you make it the object of your ambitious intrigues?” (Oratio habita in concil. prov 2)
But by the grace of God blessing thy zeal for the amendment of both sheep and lambs, thou couldst add, O Charles: “Province of Milan, take heart again. Behold, thy fathers have come to thee, and are assembled once more for the purpose of remedying thy ills. They have no other care than to see thee bring forth the fruits of salvation; and for this end they multiply their united efforts.” (Oratio habita in concil. prov 6)
My little children, of whom I am in labor again, until Christ be formed in you. (Galatians 4:19) Such is the aspiration of the Bride, which will cease only in heaven: and synods, visitations, reformation, decrees concerning preaching and government and ministry were, in thy eyes, but the manifestation of this one desire of the Church, the expression of the mother’s cry as she brings forth her children. (Concio 1 ad. clerum, in synod. diæces xi)
Deign, O blessed Pontiff, to restore in all places the love of holy discipline, wherein the pastoral solicitude that rendered thee so glorious (Collect of the feast) found the secret of its marvelous fecundity. It may be sufficient for the simple faithful merely to know that among the treasures of the Church there exists, side by side with her doctrine and Sacraments, an incomparable code, the work of ages, an object of legitimate pride to all her sons, whose divine privileges it protects. But the priest, entirely devoted to the Church, cannot serve her usefully without that profound and persevering study which will give him the understanding of her laws in detail. But clergy and laity alike must beseech God that the miseries of the times may not impede the meeting of our venerated superiors in the councils and synods prescribed at Trent, (Session 24, de. Reformatione, Cap. 2) and so grandly carried out by thee, O Charles, who didst prove by experience their value for the salvation of the world. May heaven, for thy sake, hear our prayer; and then we shall be able to say with thee to the Church: “O tender mother, let thy voice cease from weeping … for there is a reward for thy work, saith the Lord; and thy sons shall return out of the land of the enemy. And I will fill the soul of the priests with fatness: and my people shall be filled with my good things.” (Jeremiah 31:16, 14)
Let us offer our homage to two Martyrs, whose memory was celebrated on this day even before that of St. Charles. Vitalis the slave and Agricola his master, combating together in the glorious arena proved that social inequality counts for nothing with regard to heaven’s nobility. St. Ambrose, when sojourning at Bologna where they had suffered, discovered their bodies and celebrated their triumph. (Ambrose, Exortations on Virginity) The Church, following his example, has ever associated them in one common homage.
PRAYER
Grant, we beseech thee, Almighty God, that celebrating the festival of thy holy martyrs, Vitalis and Agricola, we may be assisted by their intercession with thee. Through our Lord.
Returning to the octave of all Saints, let us say the following Sequence composed by Notker, and formerly sung in Germany on the day of the feast.
SEQUENCE
All ye holy Seraphim, Cherubim,
Thrones also and Dominations,
Principalities, Powers, Virtues,
Archangels, Angels, to you beseemeth praise and honor.
Ye nine choirs of blessed spirits,
Whom charity has stablished in God’s praises,
Make us frail mortals as stable, by your prayers:
So that by your assistance, resolutely overcoming the spirits of wickedness,
We may be worthy to take part, both now and forever, in your sacred solemnities.
Ye whom the grace of God enabled to conquer the things of earth,
And associated with the Angels in heaven;
Ye patriarchs, prophets, apostles, confessors, martyrs, monks, virgins,
Assembly of holy widows, and of all who have been pleasing to the sovereign Lord,
May your assistance, now and ever, cherish and protect us,
As we pray on this day of your joys. Amen.
We gather from the euchology or ritual of the Greeks a few samples of their prayers for the dead.
IN OFFICIO EXSEQUIARUM
Come, let us bid a last farewell to the deceased, giving thanks to God. Let us pray that the Lord may give him rest.
What is our life? A little flower, a vapor, truly a morning dew. Come, then, and let us go round about the graves. Where is the beauty of the body? Where is youth? Where now are those eyes? Where that comeliness of form? All appeared as grass, all are now withered. Come, and let us with tears prostrate before Christ.
O Mother of the sun that knows no setting, save them that trust in thee. Mother of God, we beseech thee, entreat thy most loving Son to give unto him, who has left us, rest where the souls of the just repose. Establish him, O immaculate one, heir of divine possessions, and let him be in everlasting remembrance.
May Christ who rose from the dead, our true God, moved by the intercession of his spotless Mother and of all the Saints, place the soul of his departed servant in the tabernacles of the just; may he lay him to rest in the bosom of Abraham, numbering him among the just; and may he, who is both good and kind, have mercy upon us. Amen.
May thy memory be eternal, O our brother; thou shalt be forever blessed, and shalt ever be cherished in our hearts.
Glory be to God, who hath so willed!
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