Subj : =?UTF-8?Q?February_10th_=E2=80=93_St=2E_William_of_Maleval=2C_Hermit=2C To : All From : rich Date : Sun Feb 09 2020 08:27:49 From: rich February 10th =E2=80=93 St. William of Maleval, Hermit, Prophet =C2 (Also known as William of Malval or Malvalla) Born in France; died at Maleval, Italy, February 10, 1157; canonized by Innocent III in 1202. After carefree years of licentious military life, William experienced a conversion of heart of which we are told nothing. The first real piece of information we have is that the penitent Frenchman made a pilgrimage to the tombs of the apostles at Rome. Here he begged Pope Eugenius III for pardon and to set him on a course of penance for his sins. Eugenius enjoined him to make a pilgrimage to the Holy Land in 1145. William followed his counsel and spent eight years on the journey, returning to Italy a changed man. In 1153, William became a hermit on the isle of Lupocavio (near Pisa) in Tuscany for a time. So many joined him until he was prevailed upon to undertake the governance. He wasn't well suited to lead other men. First, he failed to maintain discipline at the abbey. Unable to bear the tepidity and irregularity of his monks, he withdrew to Monte Bruno. But the same thing happened when he organized the disciples who had gathered around him into his own abbey on Monte Bruno. Finally, in September 1155, he realized this was not God's plan for him and he embraced the eremitical life amid the solitude of Maleval (then called the Stable of Rhodes) near Siena. At Maleval he lived in an underground cave until the lord of Buriano discovered him some months later and built him a cell. For the first four months, William had only the beasts for company and only forage for food. The example of his life soon attracted another of like mind. On the Feast of the Epiphany 1156, he was joined by a companion named Albert, who lived with him the rest of his life--only 13 months--and recorded William's vita. Like most of the early hermits, William used extreme penances to atone for his earlier sinful life. He slept on the bare ground, ate sparingly of only the coarsest fare, and drank only limited amounts of water. Prayer, contemplation, and manual labor employed all his waking moments. William had the gift of working miracles and of prophecy. Shortly before William's death, which he predicted, he and Albert were joined by a physician named Rinaldo. The two disciples buried William in his little garden, and together studied to live according to William's maxims and example. Later their number increased and they built a chapel over their founder's grave with a hermitage; however his relics were dispersed in the wars between Siena and Grosseto. This was the origin of the Gulielmites, or Hermits of Saint William, which spread throughout Italy, France, Flanders, and Germany. Gregory IX, mitigating their austerities, gave the Rule of Saint Benedict to the group organized as the Order of Bare-Footed Friars, but they were eventually absorbed by the Augustinian hermits except for 12 houses in the Low Countries. William is honored in the new Paris Missal and Breviary, where his feast is kept at the Abbey of Blancs-Manteaux, founded in 1257 as a mendicant order, called the Servants of the Virgin Mary, but bestowed on the Gulielmites after the second council of Lyons in 1297 (Benedictines, Encyclopedia, Farmer, Husenbeth). In art, William of Maleval is similar to William of Aquitaine but with no ducal coronet. He carries a pilgrim's staff and sometimes wears a monastic habit over armor. At times he may be shown (1) bearing a cross staff, one arm of which ends in a crescent, or (2) bearing a shield with four fleur-de-lys (Roeder). He is the patron of armorers and venerated in Siena, Italy (Roeder), and Paris (Husenbeth). =C2 Quotes: "Persons who keep themselves low in their own estimation and love to be considered of little account and despised by others please God in the highest degree; and, therefore, He willingly lowers Himself to them, pours upon them the treasures of His graces, reveals to them His secrets, invites and draws them sweetly to Himself. Thus, the more one lowers and abuses himself before men, the more he rises and becomes great in the sight of God, and the more clearly he will, one day, behold the Divine Essence" --Thomas a Kempis =C2 =C2 St. Gertrude, one day hearing the little bell ring for Commun= ion and not feeling as well prepared as she desired, said to the Lord: "I see that Thou art even now coming to me; but why hast Thou not first adorned my heart with some ornaments of devotion, with which I might be more suitably prepared to come and meet Thee?" But the Lord answered: "Know that sometimes I am more pleased with the virtue of humility than with exterior devotion" --- NewsGate v1.0 gamma 2 * Origin: News Gate @ Net396 -Huntsville, AL - USA (1:396/4) .