SAINT RAYMOND of PENNAFORT
Dominican, Archbishop
(1175-1275)
Born in 1175 of a noble Spanish family, Raymond, at the age of twenty, taught philosophy in Barcelona with marvelous success. Ten years later his rare abilities won for him the degree of Doctor in the University of Bologna, accompanied by many high dignities. A tender devotion to our Blessed Lady, which had increased within him from childhood, determined him in his mature years to renounce all his honors and to enter Her Order of Saint Dominic.
There a vision of the Mother of Mercy instructed him to cooperate with his penitent Saint Peter Nolasco, and with James, King of Aragon, in founding the Order of Our Lady of Ransom for the redemption of captives. He began this great work by preaching a crusade against the Moors, and by rousing to penance the Christians enslaved in both soul and body by the infidels. The king of Aragon, a man of great qualities but governed by a ruling passion, often took Saint Raymond with him on his voyages. On one such occasion, when they were visiting the island of Majorca, he was told by the Saint he must put away at once the cause of his sin. When he delayed, Raymond asked for leave to depart, since he could not live in company with sin. The king refused and under pain of death, forbade his conveyance by any ship. The Saint replied to the sailors, "If a mortal king has given such a command, we will see that the Eternal King has disposed otherwise." Full of faith, he went out on a rock extending into the sea, and spread his cloak upon the waters. Tying one end of it to his staff as a sail, he made the sign of the cross and fearlessly stepped upon it. In six hours he was borne to Barcelona where, gathering up his cloak, which was dry, he made his way to his monastery.
The king, vanquished by this miracle, to which many were witness, became a sincere penitent and the disciple of the Saint until his death. In 1230, Gregory IX summoned Raymond to Rome, made him his confessor and grand penitentiary, and directed him to compile 'The Decretals', a collection of the scattered decisions of the Popes and Councils. Having refused the Archbishopric of Tarragon, Raymond was in 1238 chosen to be the third General of his Order, which post he again succeeded in resigning, pleading his advanced age. His first act when set free was to resume his labors among the infidels, and in 1256 Raymond, then eighty-one, was able to report that ten thousand Saracens had received Baptism. He died at the age of one hundred years, in 1275.
With King James of Aragon and St. Peter Nolasco he founded the Order of Our Lady of Ransom (we had this day on the 16th) dedicated to rescuing Christian prisoners from their Muslim captors.
St. Raymond is often pictured sailing over water using his cloak as a sail. When accompanying King James to the island of Majorca, the latter, despite his qualities, was giving scandal. At the saint’s rebuke, the king promised to send the woman away but did not follow through on his word. On hearing of the saint’s threat to leave the island, the king forbade every captain in Majorca to grant him passage.
Laying his cloak upon the waves and holding one end of it over a staff, the saint prayed, made the sign of the cross, stepped onto his cloak and sailed for six hours back to the Spanish mainland – which fact converted the king.
St. Raymond was known as a great devotee of Our Lady, an ascetic, contemplative, lawyer, preacher, opposer of heresies and apostle to Muslims.
Reflection. Ask Saint Raymond to protect you from the fearful servitude, worse than any bodily slavery, which even one sinful habit tends to form.
Another take:
Saint Raymond of Peñafort’s Story
Since Raymond lived into his hundredth year, he had a chance to do many things. As a member of the Spanish nobility, he had the resources and the education to get a good start in life.By the time he was 20, he was teaching philosophy. In his early 30s he earned a doctorate in both canon and civil law. At 41 he became a Dominican. Pope Gregory IX called him to Rome to work for him and to be his confessor. One of the things the pope asked him to do was to gather together all the decrees of popes and councils that had been made in 80 years since a similar collection by Gratian. Raymond compiled five books called the Decretals. They were looked upon as one of the best organized collections of Church law until the 1917 codification of Canon Law.
Earlier, Raymond had written for confessors a book of cases. It was called Summa de Casibus Poenitentiae. More than simply a list of sins and penances, it discussed pertinent doctrines and laws of the Church that pertained to the problem or case brought to the confessor.
At the age of 60, Raymond was appointed archbishop of Tarragona, the capital of Aragon. He didn’t like the honor at all and ended up getting sick and resigning in two years.
He didn’t get to enjoy his peace long, however, because when he was 63 he was elected by his fellow Dominicans to be the head of the whole Order, the successor of Saint Dominic. Raymond worked hard, visited on foot all the Dominicans, reorganized their constitutions and managed to put through a provision that a master general be allowed to resign. When the new constitutions were accepted, Raymond, then 65, resigned.
He still had 35 years to oppose heresy and work for the conversion of the Moors in Spain. He convinced Saint Thomas Aquinas to write his work Against the Gentiles.
In his 100th year, the Lord let Raymond retire.
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