Send your thoughts to Letters to the Editor. Learn more
Today is the feast of St. Charles Borromeo.
In Editae Saepe, his encyclical on St. Charles Borromeo, St. Pius X wrote:
From 31: "Like the Divine Master 'he went about doing good and healing.' He spared no efforts in suppressing and uprooting the abuses he met everywhere either because of ignorance or neglect of the laws. He checked the rampant perversion of ideas and corruption of morals by founding schools for the children and colleges for youth. After seeing their early beginnings in Rome, he promoted the Marian societies. He founded orphanages for the fatherless, shelters for girls in danger, widows, mendicants, and men and women made destitute by sickness or old age. He opened institutions to protect the poor against tyrannical masters, usurers, and the enslavement of children. He accomplished all these things by completely ignoring the methods of those who think human society can be restored only by utter destruction, revolution, and noisy slogans. Such persons have forgotten the divine words: 'The Lord is not in the earthquake.'"
In 1992, Pope John Paul II presented the Catechism of the Catholic Church to the People of God. This catechism, prepared by "a commission of twelve Cardinals and Bishops, chaired by Cardinal Joseph Ratzinger," mentions St. Charles Borromeo in its Prologue:
From II:9: "The Council of Trent initiated a remarkable organization of the Church's catechesis. Thanks to the work of holy bishops and theologians such as St. Peter Canisius, St. Charles Borromeo, St. Turibius of Mongrovejo or St. Robert Bellarmine, it occasioned the publication of numerous catechisms."
From II:10: "It is therefore no surprise that catechesis in the Church has again attracted attention in the wake of the Second Vatican Council, which Pope Paul VI considered the great catechism of modern times."
Scroll down halfway to see Carolus Cardinal Borromeo's signature on a receipt for twelve books he returned to the Vatican library.
-- Submitted by Gerelyn Hollingsworth
