Feast date: Dec 17

St. Jose Manyanet y Vives was born on January 7, 1883 in Catalonia, Spain. At the age of five, José’s mother dedicated him to the Virgin Mary, and later entered the seminary while still a youth. He was ordained in 1859 and served as the secretary of the bishop of Urgell, the seminary librarian, and the chancery administrator before responding to the call to found two religious congregations.

He founded the Congregation of the Sons of the Holy Family in 1864, and the Missionary Daughters of the Holy Family of Nazareth 10 years later, both dedicated to the education and protection of the Christian family, as well as education and parish ministry.

He also founded several schools and centers, encouraged devotion to the Holy Family, and wrote many books on issues surrounding the family and spiritual guidance. Also, in the cultural ambit he worked for the construction of the Servant of God Antonio Gaudí’s masterpiece, the Temple of the Holy Family in Barcelona, Spain.

He suffered from physical illnesses all his life, particularly due to two open wounds in his sides for the last 16 years of his life. He died on December 17, 1901 in Spain, and was canonized May 16, 2004 by Pope John Paul II.

Feast date: Dec 17

Born sometime between 360-365, this pious, charitable, and wealthy disciple of St. John Chrysostom came from an illustrious family in Constantinople. Her father (called by the sources Secundus or Selencus) was a "Count" of the empire. One of her ancestors, Ablabius, filled the consulor office in 331, and was also praetorian prefect of the East.

As Olympias was not thirty years of age in 390, she cannot have been born before 361. Her parents died when she was quite young, and left her an immense fortune. In either 384 or 385 she married Nebridius, Prefect of Constantinople. St. Gregory of Nazianzus, who had left Constantinople in 381, was invited to the wedding, but wrote a letter excusing his absence (Ep. cxciii, in P.G., XXXVI, 315), and sent the bride a poem (P.G., loc. cit., 1542 sqq.). Within a short time Nebridius died, and Olympias was left a childless widow. She steadfastly rejected all new proposals of marriage, determining to devote herself to the service of God and to works of charity. Nectarius, Bishop of Constantinople (381-97), consecrated her deaconess.

On the death of her husband, the emperor had appointed the urban prefect administrator of her property, but in 391 (after the war against Maximus) he restored to her the administration of her large fortune. She built beside the principal church of Constantinople a convent, into which three relatives and a large number of maidens withdrew with her to consecrate themselves to the service of God. When St. John Chrysostom became Bishop of Constantinople in 398, he acted as spiritual guide of Olympias and her companions, and, as many undeserving approached the kind-hearted deaconess for support, he advised her as to the proper manner of utilizing her vast fortune in the service of the poor (Sozomen, "Hist. eccl.", VIII, ix; P.G., LXVII, 1540). Olympias resigned herself wholly to Chrysostom's direction, and placed at his disposal ample sums for religious and charitable objects. Even the most distant regions of the empire received her benefactions to churches and the poor.

When Chrysostom was exiled, Olympias supported him in every possible way, and remained a faithful disciple, refusing to enter into communion with his unlawfully appointed successor. Chrysostom encouraged and guided her through his letters, of which seventeen are extant (P.G., LII, 549 sqq.). These are a beautiful memorial of the noble-hearted, spiritual daughter of the great bishop.

Olympias was also exiled, and died a few months after Chrysostom on July 25, 408, probably at Nicomedia. After her death she was venerated as a saint. A biography dating from the second half of the fifth century, which gives particulars concerning her from the "Historia Lausiaca" of Palladius and from the "Dialogus de vita Joh. Chrysostomi", proves the great veneration she enjoyed. During he riot of Constantinople in 532, the convent of St. Olympias and the adjacent church were destroyed.

Emperor Justinian had it rebuilt, and the prioress, Sergia, transferred there the remains of the foundress from the ruined church of St. Thomas in Brokhthes, where she had been buried. We possess an account of this translation by Sergia herself. The feast of St. Olympias is celebrated in the Greek Church on July 24, and in the Roman Church on December 17.

Source: The Catholic Encyclopedia

Armed men attacked an evangelical church in Nigeria during a Sunday service, killing one person and abducting 13 worshippers.

The December 14 attack on the Evangelical Church Winning All was the second such attack on a church in the area in the past two weeks. The church is located in Aaaaz-Kiri, in Nigeria’s Kogi State.

The bishop of Hong Kong dismissed claims of religious persecution there.

Recalling a journalist’s question during a trip to Australia, Cardinal Stephen Chow, SJ, said that “I don’t perceive any religious persecution here.”

“We can freely attend church, regardless of age; Catholics can run schools in Hong Kong and talk about religion in schools; Caritas Hong Kong offers a variety of services to citizens, many of which are funded by the government,” added Cardinal Chow, appointed Hong Kong’s bishop in 2021.

Amid bankruptcy proceedings, the Diocese of Oakland, California, has offered $242 million to settle lawsuits filed by 350 people who allege they were sexually abused by clergy.

“Everyone knows it’s not fair, everyone knows it’s not morally right, and everyone knows it is just plain inadequate,” said Rick Simons, attorney for the plaintiffs, who had previously rejected a $165-million settlement offer.

The pastor of Gaza’s sole Catholic parish said in a new video that people there are “very depressed.”

“There are no more widespread bombings, but unfortunately the war is continuing,” said Father Gabriel Romanelli, IVE. “We still hear bombs today,” and most Gaza residents have are without electricity and drinking water, “which is why many gastrointestinal diseases are developing and spreading.”

“We try to continue with our lives, and we continue to pray, usually for three hours a day, with adoration of the Blessed Sacrament, the Holy Rosary, Mass and other prayers,” he added. “Every day we pray for peace.”

A court in Spain’s Basque Country acquitted 21 peaceful pro-life protestors of harassment charges.

The participants in the prayer vigil, who took part in a 40 Days for Life campaign, stood 50 feet from an abortion clinic and displayed posters with messages like “you are not alone, we are here to help you.”

The court ruled that the protestors had “done nothing more than exercise their free right of assembly” and behaved in an “exquisitely peaceful manner.” Prosecutors had sought five-month prison sentences.

Father Renato Kizito Sesana, a Comboni missionary, described recent attacks on civilians in Sudan’s Nuba Mountains as the fighting in the nation’s civil war spreads there.

Quoted in the most prominent article in the Vatican newspaper’s December 16 edition, Father Sesana spoke of drone attacks on “a small clinic, near a school, where training sessions are occasionally held for boys and girls who provide health services in the villages.”

The missionary recounted:

The first drone struck suddenly, killing many people instantly. However, a second attack, which occurred a few minutes later, made the massacre even worse. Between the first and second attacks, other students, children from the nearby school, and people who had rushed to help the wounded had arrived. The second drone struck them as well.

Christian Solidarity International reported that the nation’s army was responsible for the attack.

Sister Raffaella Petrini, president of the Governatorate of the Vatican City State, presided at the inauguration of the Christmas tree and Nativity scene in St. Peter’s Square on the evening of December 15 (video).

The tree comes from the northern Italian Diocese of Bolzano-Bressanone; the Nativity scene comes from the southern Italian Diocese of Nocera Inferiore-Sarno.

In a foreword to a new book on the Second Vatican Council, a former director of the Holy See Press Office praised the authors for “rekindling the desire to personally read the Council documents in their original and complete text.”

Father Federico Lombardi, SJ, president of the Joseph Ratzinger—Benedict XVI Vatican Foundation, said that the conciliar documents “are not hermetic writings for specialists ... In fact, we probably understand them better if we read them ourselves rather than having them explained to us by others.”

Father Lombardi also praised the authors—Dariusz Kowalczyk and Enrichetta Cesarale, who teach at the Pontifical Gregorian University—for avoiding polemics. “It is right to avoid, indeed to reject without hesitation, a ‘hermeneutic of rupture,’ in order to share that of ‘reform in continuity,’” wrote Father Lombardi, citing Pope Benedict XVI’s 2005 Christmas address to the Curia.