a plenary indulgence on each of the said Tuesdays or Sundays.
Note. — St. Anthony of Padua, of the Order of St. Francis, was by birth a Portuguese. In life, as after death, he worked many miracles, and was famous for learning as well as for holiness. He died at Padua, in north Italy, whence the name by which he is universally known.
In 1231, on June 13th, when the saint was thirty-six years of age, his brief but brilliant apostolate came to a sudden close. After his death, beginning on the day of his burial at Padua, which happened on Tuesday, June 17th, so many miracles were wrought through the intercession of St. Anthony, that already in the following year, on May 30, 1232, he was publicly and solemnly declared a saint by Pope Gregory IX.
Devotions in Honor of St. Francis of Assisi
The Five Sundays in Honor of the Sacred Stigmata
(Feast, September 17th)
To all the faithful who, upon the five Sundays which immediately precede the feast of the sacred Stigmata of St. Francis of Assisi, or upon any other five consecutive Sundays during the year, shall exercise themselves either in pious meditation, or in vocal prayer, or in any other work of Christian piety, in honor of the said sacred Stigmata, a plenary indulgence is granted once a year, on each of the five Sundays, on the usual conditions. — Leo XIII, Nov. 21, 1885.
THE seraphic St. Francis of Assisi, in September, 1224, being rapt in contemplation on the desolate Mount Alvernia in the Apennines, received from Almighty God the wondrous grace of having impressed on his hands, feet, and side, the likeness of the sacred wounds of Christ. From these stigmata blood flowed at intervals, until the day of the saint's death, two years later. The Holy See has decreed that this miracle be annually commemorated in the Church, on September 17.
