DECEMBER 7TH, SECOND SUNDAY OF ADVENT;
(Pre-55: Commemoration of Saint Ambrose)
Month in honor of the Nativity of OLJC.
An invincible courage and constancy in resisting evil is a necessary ingredient of virtue especially in the episcopal character. Gentleness, meekness, humility, and obedience, make the servant of God ready to yield and conform himself to every one in things indifferent: but in those of duty he is inflexible, not with wilfulness or obstinacy, but with modesty, yet invincible firmness.
Of this virtue, St. Ambrose, in the judgment of the learned Hermant, was the most admirable model among all the great pastors of God’s church since the apostles. His father, whose name was also Ambrose, was prefect of the prtorium in Gaul, by which office not only France, but also a considerable part of Italy and Germany, the five Roman provinces in Britain, eight in Spain, and Mauritania Tingitana in Africa, were under his jurisdiction. He was blessed with three children: Marcellina, the eldest, who received the religious veil from the hands of pope Liberius, Satyrus, and our saint, who bore his father’s name. It is clear from Paulinus that he was born in the city where his father resided, and kept his court in Gaul, but whether this was Arles, Lyons, or Triers, modern authors are not agreed in their conjectures. The saint’s birth happened about the year AD 340. The story is told that, while the child lay asleep in one of the courts of his father’s palace, a swarm of bees flew about his cradle, and some of them crept in and out at his mouth, which was open; at last they mounted up into the air so high, that they quite vanished out of sight. This was esteemed a presage of future greatness and eloquence. The same is said to have happened to Plato. The father of St. Ambrose dying while he was yet an infant, his mother left Gaul and returned to Rome, her own country. She took special care of the education of her children and Ambrose profited much by her instructions, and by the domestic examples which she, his sister, and other holy virgins that were with them, set him.
He learned the Greek language, became a good poet and orator, and went with his brother Satyrus from Rome to Milan which was then the seat of the prætorium, or supreme court of judicature. His writings are to this day a standing proof how vigorously he applied himself to human literature. Having finished his studies, he was taken notice of, and his friendship was courted by the first men of the empire, particularly by Anicius Probus and Symmachus, two persons of great learning and abilities, though the latter was an idolater. The first was made by Valentinian, in AD 368, Prætorian Prefect of Italy, and in his court St. Ambrose pleaded causes with so much reputation, that Probus made choice of him to be his Assessor. Afterwards he made him Governor of Liguria and Mila, that is, of all that country which comprehends at this day the archbishoprics, with the suffragan dioceses, of Milan, Turin, Genoa Ravenna, and Bologna. Probus, who was a magistrate of great worth and integrity, said to him at parting: “Go thy way, and govern more like a bishop than a judge.” The young governor, by his watchfulness, probity, and mildness, endeavored to comply with this advice, which was most conformable to his natural goodness and inclinations. Auxentius, an Arian, and a violent and subtle persecutor of the Catholics, who upon the banishment of St. Dionysius had usurped the See of Milan, and held it tyrannically for almost twenty years, died in AD 374. The city was distracted by furious parties and tumults about the election of a new bishop, some of the clergy and people demanding an Arian, others a Catholic for their pastor. To prevent an open sedition, St. Ambrose thought it the duty of his office to go to the church in which the assembly was held: there he made an oration to the people with much discretion and mildness, exhorting them to proceed in their choice with the spirit of peace, and without tumult. While he was yet speaking, a child cried out, “Ambrose Bishop.” This the whole assembly took up, and both Catholics and Arians unanimously proclaimed him bishop of Milan.
Though only a catechumen, it was the will of God that he should himself be chosen by acclamation; and, in spite of his utmost resistance, he was baptized, ordained, and consecrated. He was unwearied in every duty of a pastor, full of sympathy and charity, gentle and condescending in things indifferent, but inflexible in matters of principle. He showed his fearless zeal in braving the anger of the Empress Justina, by resisting and foiling her impious attempt to give one of the churches of Milan to the Arians, and by rebuking and leading to penance the really great Emperor Theodosius, who in a moment of irritation had punished most cruelly a sedition of the inhabitants of Thessalonica. He was the friend and consoler of St. Monica in all her sorrows, and in AD 387 he had the joy of admitting to the Church her son, St. Augustine. St. Ambrose died in AD 397, full of years and of honors, and is revered by the Church of God as one of her greatest Doctors.
Reflection.-- Whence came to St. Ambrose his grandeur of mind, his clearness of insight, his intrepidity in maintaining the faith and discipline of the Church? Whence but from his contempt of the world, from his fearing God alone?