One of the things many adults remember from their high school chemistry course is that litmus paper turns red when placed in a solution of acid. In other words, red-colored litmus paper is a sure sign that acid is present. Paul says that love performs a similar function when it comes to true Christian faith. Love is a sure sign that the Christian faith is present. In other words, if we are loving toward other people, it’s a sure sign that our faith is truly Christian.
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How loving are we in our relationships? How seriously do we work at those relationships to keep them growing and developing in the right direction? “I may have all the faith needed to move mountains—but if I have no love, I am nothing.” Corinthians 13:2
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Oct 13, St Edward the Confessor King (1004 -1066)
A saintly, conscientious man, much given to prayer and works of mercy, Edward’s early misfortunes taught him to deprecate all earthly ambitions, and he now concentrated fully on governing his people with Christian gentleness, justice and prudence. Long abandoned monasteries were restored, and in the interest of better education it was decreed that schoolmasters, like clerics, were to be regarded as inviolable. Except for the occasion when Edward gave aid to Malcolm II of Scotland against usurper Macbeth, and another when he repelled a Welsh invasion, his 23¬year reign was one of peace and prosperity.
Canonized in 1161, Edward was the first English King to touch and heal scrofulous sores, “the King’s Evil”, with his ring—a power which had been conferred originally on the Kings of France by St Remi. Edward’s famous death-bed vision of his country’s future has seen remarkable fulfilment: “When the measure of wickedness will have become full, then will God in his wrath send wicked spirits among the English people, and they will punish and afflict them with great severity by separating the green branch from the parent trunk for the space of three furlongs; but in the end, through the compassionate mercy of God, and without any governmental assistance, this same branch will return to its original fruit, will flourish anew and bear abundant fruit.” The period of time from Henry VIII’s break with Rome in 1534 and the rule of the Protestant innovators until 1850 when Pope Pius IX re-established the Catholic hierarchy in England, is in fact slightly more than three centuries.
