Saint John Mary Vianney, PriestOffice of Readings | Morning Prayer | Evening Prayer | Night Prayer | MassSt Jean-Baptiste-Marie Vianney, Curé of Ars (1786 - 1859)

He was the son of a peasant farmer, and a slow and unpromising candidate for the priesthood: he was eventually ordained on account of his devoutness rather than any achievement or promise.In 1818 he was sent to be the parish priest of Ars-en-Dombes, an isolated village some distance from Lyon, and remained there for the rest of his life because his parishioners would not let him leave. He was a noted preacher, and a celebrated confessor: such was his fame, and his reputation for insight into his penitents’ souls and their futures, that he had to spend up to eighteen hours a day in the confessional, so great was the demand. The tens of thousands of people who came to visit this obscure parish priest turned Ars into a place of pilgrimage.“The Curé refused to sit for a portrait. When the sculptor Cabuchet surreptitiously tried to capture his features in a ball of wax during the catechism, Vianney sternly bounced him out of the church.” (The Curé d’Ars Today, by G.W.Rutler, 1988).The French State recognised his eminence by awarding him the medal of the Légion d’Honneur in 1848, and he sold it and gave the money to the poor.

18th Sunday in Ordinary TimeOffice of Readings | Morning Prayer | Evening Prayer | Night Prayer | Mass(St Germanus of Auxerre (c.378 - 448))

After pursuing a legal career and being governor of a province, he was consecrated bishop of Auxerre in Gaul. In 429 he was selected as one of the leaders of a mission to Britain to combat the growing heresy of Pelagianism. His mission was successful, and he also led the native Britons to a victory against the invading pagan Picts and Saxons. He visited Britain a second time in the 440s, to combat Pelagianism once more, and he died at Ravenna in the late 440s, while on a mission to the emperor to obtain pardon for the citizens of Armorica, which had rebelled against the Roman government.(St Oswald (c.604 - 642))

Saturday of week 17 in Ordinary Time, or Saint Eusebius of Vercelli, Bishop

, or Saint Peter Julian Eymard, Priest