September 19th, St. Januarius

Post by **Denise** » Sat Sep 19, 2020 8:17 am

St. Januarius, witness of the Most Precious Blood of Christ

The miracle of St. Januarius did take place this year on May 2, 2020: a happy omen for the Neapolitans, while the rest of the Italian peninsula was badly hit by the coronavirus epidemic.

Cardinal Archbishop of Naples, Msgr. Crescenzio Sepe, declared on May 2, 2020: “Dear friends, I have an important announcement to communicate to you: even in this period marked by the coronavirus epidemic, the blood of St. Januarius was liquefied by the intervention of the Lord.”

On the same day, during the Mass celebrated in his empty cathedral—per the confinement requirements—and broadcast live via the peninsula’s media, he explained in his homily: “We can no longer count the number of times the saint has intervened to save us from the plague, from cholera. In a word, St. Januarius is the soul of Naples.” Then he blessed the city with the ampulla containing the liquefied blood.

St. Januarius—San Gennaro in Italian—bishop and patron of Naples, lived in the third century and suffered martyrdom during the Diocletian persecution. His relics are kept in the metropolitan church.

The miracle of the liquefaction of his blood generally occurs three times a year: on September 19, the liturgical feast of the saint; the Saturday before the first Sunday in May; and December 16, the day when the Neapolitan city commemorates the eruption of Mount Vesuvius, occurring in 1631.

As soon as the miracle occurs, the dried, reddish mass, confined to one side of the reliquary, becomes liquid, and then covers the entire glass wall.

Local tradition reports that when the miracle does not happen, a disaster will take place in the city. So while the Neapolitans are relieved by the kindly regards their patron saint sent them on May 2, 2020, a large part of Italy continues to bury its dead, victims of the Covid-19 coronavirus.

Saint Januarius
Bishop of Beneventum, Martyr
(† 305)

Many centuries ago, Saint Januarius died for the Faith during the persecution of Diocletian. God, through the blood which His servant shed for Him, some of which is conserved in Naples, continues to strengthen the faith of the Church, and to work there a regular miracle by its means.

This beloved Saint of the late third century was the bishop of Beneventum, and had a friend, a deacon named Sosius, who like himself was occupied with fortifying the Christians faced with martyrdom. When the prefect of Pouzzoles, where Sosius had been imprisoned, heard that Januarius was coming to visit him and three other fervent Christians being held there, he had him arrested. He urged him to cease his exhortations, forbidden by the imperial edicts, and to offer incense to the idols, if he wanted to avoid torture. The holy bishop replied that he could not do so. He was submitted to torments, the first one of which left him miraculously uninjured. The judge attributed the miracle to magic, as was often said of the Christians whom God chose to spare. He ordered another torture which left the bishop lame, before he was sent to the same prison as the others.

When two ecclesiastics of Benevent came to visit the confessors, they were arrested and condemned to die with the other five in an amphitheater, by the teeth of wild beasts. The animals, furious when released into the space where the seven Confessors stood, came and quietly lay down at their feet, renewing a miracle seen more than once in the history of the first centuries. By this prodigy and other miracles which preceded their execution, five thousand persons were converted. The bishop and his companions were decapitated on September 19, 305. A church was built on a nearby mountain to honor the memory of Saint Januarius.

Little did the heathen governor think, when he condemned them, that he would be the instrument in God's hand for ushering in a long succession of miracles which commemorate the faith and attest the sanctity of Januarius. His relics repose in the cathedral of Naples, and it is there that the liquefaction of his blood occurs. The blood is congealed in two glass vials, but when it is brought near the martyr's head, it melts and flows like the blood of a living man. This ordinarily occurs on his feast day celebrated on September 17th in Naples, and on anniversaries of miracles attributed to him, which have preserved the city from eruptions of Mount Vesuvius or the plague. Some have tried to explain this miracle by natural causes, but none have ever contested the reality of the facts.