From: "Waldtraud" 

March 23rd - Blessed Sibyllina Biscossi, OP Tert. (AC) (also known as Sybillina)

Born in Pavia, Italy, in 1287; died 1367; cultus approved in 1853; beatified in 1854.

"All things work for the good of those who love the Lord and are
called according to His purpose" (Romans 8:28). How many of us would
have the faith to trust in God's providence as did this holy woman? As
Mother Angelica has witnessed, true faith is knowing that when the Lord
asks you to walk into the void, He will place a rock beneath your feet.
True faith is to be able to praise God in all things; to say with Job,
"The Lord gives and the Lord takes away. Blessed be the name of the
Lord" (Job 1:21).

Sybillina's parents died when she was tiny and as soon as she was old
enough to be of use to anyone, the neighbors, who had taken her in at the
time she was orphaned, put her out to work. She must have been very young
when she started to work, because at the age of 12, when she became blind
and could not work any more, she already had several years of work behind
her.

The cause of her blindness is unknown, but the child was left doubly
destitute with the loss of her sight. The local chapter of the Dominican
tertiary sisters took compassion on the child and brought her home to live
with them. After a little while of experiencing their kind help, she wanted
to join them. They accepted her, young though she was, more out of pity
than in any hope of her being able to carry on their busy and varied
apostolate.

They were soon agreeably surprised to find out how much she could do. She
learned to chant the Office quickly and sweetly, and to absorb their
teaching about mental prayer as though she had been born for it. She
imposed great obligations of prayer on herself, since she could not help
them in other ways. Her greatest devotion was to Saint Dominic, and it was
to him she addressed herself when she finally became convinced that she
simply must have her sight back so that she could help the sisters with
their work.

Praying earnestly for this intention, Sybillina waited for his feast day.
Then, she was certain, he would cure her. Matins came and went with no
miracle; little hours, Vespers-and she was still blind. With a sinking
heart, Sybillina knelt before Saint Dominic's statue and begged him to help
her. Kneeling there, she was rapt in ecstasy, and she saw him come out of
the darkness and take her by the hand.

He took her to a dark tunnel entrance, and she went into the blackness at
his word. Terrified, but still clinging to his hand, she advanced past
invisible horrors, still guided and protected by his presence. Dawn came
gradually, and then light, then a blaze of glory. "In eternity, dear
child," he said. "Here, you must suffer darkness so that you may
one day behold eternal light."

Sybillina, the eager child, was replaced by a mature and thoughtful
Sybillina who knew that there would be no cure for her, that she must work
her way to heaven through the darkness. She decided to become a anchorite,
and obtained the necessary permission. In 1302, at the age of 15, she was
sealed into a tiny cell next to the Dominican church at Pavia. At first she
had a companion, but her fellow recluse soon gave up the life. Sybillina
remained, now alone, as well as blind.

The first seven years were the worst, she later admitted. The cold was
intense, and she never permitted herself a fire. The church, of course, was
not heated, and she wore the same clothes winter and summer. In the winter
there was only one way to keep from freezing-keep moving-so she
genuflected, and gave herself the discipline. She slept on a board and ate
practically nothing. To the tiny window, that was her only communication
with the outside world, came the troubled and the sinful and the sick, all
begging for her help. She prayed for all of them, and worked many miracles
in the lives of the people of Pavia.

One of the more amusing requests came from a woman who was terrified of the
dark. Sybillina was praying for her when she saw her in a vision, and
observed that the woman-who thought she was hearing things-put on a fur
hood to shut out the noise. The next day the woman came to see her, and
Sybillina laughed gaily. "You were really scared last night, weren't
you?" she asked. "I laughed when I saw you pull that hood over
your ears." The legend reports that the woman was never frightened
again.

Sybillina had a lively sense of the Real Presence and a deep devotion to
the Blessed Sacrament. One day a priest was going past her window with
Viaticum for the sick; she knew that the host was not consecrated, and told
him so. He investigated, and found he had indeed taken a host from the
wrong container.

Sybillina lived as a recluse for 67 years. She followed all the Masses and
Offices in the church, spending what few spare minutes she had working with
her hands to earn a few alms for the poor (Attwater2, Benedictines, Dorcy).



Whoever will come after Me, let him deny himself.  (Matthew 16:24)

"If we do not pay great attention to mortifying our own will, there
are many things that can take from us that holy liberty of spirit, which we
seek in order to be able to mount freely towards our Creator, without being
always weighed down with earth and lead. Besides, in a soul that belongs to
itself, and is attached to its own will, there can never be solid
virtue"
-St. Teresa

 St. Mary Magdalen de' Pazzi said one day that she asked nothing of the Lord
except that He would take her own will from her; for she knew that through
the vivacity of her disposition, she did not advance so much as she desired
in those virtues which render a soul most pleasing to the Lord. After
saying this, she raised her eyes to Heaven and fell into an ecstasy, in
which she was shown by God how much harm is done to souls, especially those
of religious, when they are guided by their own will which they once
consecrated to God by vow. In the course of the ecstasy, she took her
Superior by the hand and led her to the oratory, where she knelt and prayed
the Virgin to enlighten her Superior also, that she might take pains to
despoil her of her will; and after prostrating herself three times upon the
ground, she recovered from her trance. She was so much in earnest in this
matter that she once said she did not remember ever to have tried, either
secretly or openly, to incline the will of her Superior to her own.

(Taken from the book "A Year with the Saints".  March - Mortification)

Bible Quote:
19 Jesus answered, and said to them: Destroy this temple, and in three days
I will raise it up. 20 The Jews then said: Six and forty years was this
temple in building; and wilt thou raise it up in three days?   21 But he
spoke of the temple of his body. 22 When therefore he was risen again from
the dead, his disciples remembered, that he had said this, and they
believed the scripture, and the word that Jesus had said.    (John 2:19-22)



The fifth sorrowful mystery prayer of the Eucharistic Rosary, to be offered
before the Blessed Sacrament:

The Crucifixion and Death of Our Lord, offered for self- sacrifice for God,
and our neighbor, forgiveness of injuries:

O good and merciful Saviour! Thy love, more than iron nails, keeps Thee
riveted to the cross whereon Thou atonest for our sins in the midst of
unspeakable torments; we find Thee also riveted by the same love in the
Sacrament of the Altar, continuing Thy sacrifice to the end of ages in
order to apply to us the fruits thereof.

Sweet Lamb, perpetually immolated for us, we adore Thee, and we beg of
Thee, through the intercession of Thy holy Mother, such a hatred of sin as
will make us prefer the death of the body to the staining of the soul.

Imprimatur:  + John M. Farley, Archbishop of New York, Sept 19, 1908.


**Don't forget to pray the Stations of the Cross on Fridays

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