Ambrose, Bishop of Milan, the son of a Roman citizen, whose name was also Ambrose, and who held the office of Prefect of Cisalpine Gaul. It is related that when the saint was an infant, a swarm of bees rested on his lips. It was a presage of his future extraordinary eloquence. He received a liberal education at Rome and not long after was appointed, by the Prefect Probus, to be Governor of Liguria and Emilia whence, later on, he was sent, by order of the same Probus, to Milan, with power of Judge, for the people of that city were quarrelling among themselves about the successor of the Arian Bishop Auxentius who had died. Wherefore, Ambrose, having entered the Church that he might fulfil the duty that had been imposed on him, and quell the disturbance that had arisen, delivered an eloquent discourse on the advantages of peace and tranquillity in a State. Scarcely had he finished speaking, than a boy exclaimed: “Ambrose, Bishop!” The whole multitude shouted: “Ambrose, Bishop!” On his refusing to accede to their entreaties, the earnest request of the people was presented to the Emperor Valentinian, who was gratified that they whom he selected as Judges were thus sought after to be made Priests. It was also pleasing to the Prefect Probus who, as though he foresaw the event, said to Ambrose on his setting out: “Go, act not as Judge, but as Bishop.” The desire of the people being thus seconded by the will of the Emperor, Ambrose was baptised (for he was only a catechumen), and was admitted to sacred Orders, ascending by all the degrees of Orders as prescribed by the Church. And on the eighth day, which was the seventh of the Ides of December (December 7th), he received the burden of the Episcopacy.
Being made Bishop, he most strenuously defended the Catholic faith and ecclesiastical discipline. He converted to the true faith many Arians and other heretics among whom was that brightest luminary of the Church, Saint Augustine, the spiritual child of Ambrose in Christ Jesus. When the Emperor Gratian was killed by Maximus, he was twice deputed to go to this murderer and insist on his doing penance for his crime, which he refusing to do, Ambrose refused to hold communion with him. The Emperor Theodosius having made himself guilty of the massacre at Thessalonica was forbidden by the Saint to enter the church. On the Emperor excusing himself by saying that King David had also committed murder and adultery, Ambrose replied: “You have imitated his sin, now imitate his repentance.” Upon which, Theodosius humbly performed the public penance which the Bishop imposed on him. The holy Bishop having thus gone through the greatest labours and solicitudes for God’s Church, and having written several admirable books, foretold the day of his death even before being taken with his last sickness. Honoratus, the Bishop of Vercelli, was thrice admonished by the voice of God to go to the dying Saint. He went and administered to him the Sacred Body of our Lord. Ambrose having received it and placing his hands in the form of the cross, prayed and yielded his soul up to God on the vigil of the Nones of April (April 4th) 397.
Dom Prosper Guéranger:
This illustrious Pontiff was deservedly placed in the Calendar of the Church side by side with the glorious Bishop of Myra. Nicholas confessed at Nicaea the divinity of the Redeemer. Ambrose, in his city of Milan, was the object of the hatred of the Arians and, by his invincible courage, triumphed over the enemies of Christ. Let Ambrose, then, unite his voice as Doctor of the Church with that of Saint Peter Chrysologus, and preach to the world the glories and the humiliations of the Messiah. But as Doctor of the Church he has a special claim to our veneration: it is that among the bright luminaries of the Latin Church, four great Masters head the list of sacred Interpreters of the Faith: Gregory, Augustine, Jerome, and then our glorious Ambrose, Bishop of Milan, makes up the mystic number.
Ambrose owes his noble position in the Calendar to the ancient custom of the Church by which, in the early ages, no Saint’s feast was allowed to be kept in Lent. The day of his departure from this world and of his entrance into Heaven was the fourth of April which, more frequently than not, comes during Lent: so that it was requisite that the memory of his sacred death should be solemnised on some other day, and the seventh of December naturally presented itself for such a feast, inasmuch as it was the anniversary day of Ambrose being consecrated Bishop.
But, independently of these considerations, the road which leads us to Bethlehem could be perfumed by nothing so fragrant as by this feast of Saint Ambrose. Does not the thought of this saintly and amiable Bishop impress us with the image of dignity and sweetness combined? of the strength of the lion united with the gentleness of the dove? Time removes the deepest human impressions but the memory of Ambrose is as vivid and dear in men’s minds as though he was still among us. Who can ever forget the young, yet staid and learned governor of Liguria and Emilia, who comes to Milan as a simple catechumen and finds himself forced, by the acclamations of the people, to ascend the episcopal throne of this great city? And how indelibly impressed on us are certain touching incidents of his early life! For instance, that beautiful presage of his irresistible eloquence — the swarm of bees coming round him as he was sleeping one day in his father’s garden, and entering into his mouth as though they would tell us how sweet that babe’s words would be? and the prophetic gravity with which Ambrose, when quite a boy, would hold out his hand to his mother and sister, bidding them kiss it, for that one day it would be the hand of a Bishop!
But what hard work awaited the neophyte of Milan who was no sooner regenerated in the waters of baptism than he was consecrated Priest and Bishop! He had to apply himself, there and then, to a close study of the sacred Scriptures, that so he might prepare himself to become the defender of the Church which was attacked in the fundamental dogma of the Incarnation by the false science of the Arians. In a short time he attained such proficiency in the sacred sciences, as to become, like the Prophet, a wall of brass which checked the further progress of Arianism: not only so, but the works written by Ambrose possessed that plenitude and surety of doctrine as to be numbered by the Church among the most faithful and authoritative interpretations of her teaching. But Ambrose had other and fiercer contests than those of religious controversy to encounter: his very life was more than once threatened by the heretics whom he had silenced. What a sublime spectacle that of a Bishop blockaded in his church by the troops of the Empress Justina, and defended within by his people, day and night! Pastor and flock, both are admirable. How had Ambrose merited such fidelity and confidence on the part of this people? By a whole life spent for the welfare of his city and his country. He had never ceased to preach Jesus to all men. And now, the people see their Bishop become, by his zeal, his devotedness, and his self-sacrificing conduct, a living image of Jesus.
In the midst of these dangers which threatened his person, his great soul was calm and seemingly unconscious of the fury of his enemies. It was on that very occasion that he instituted at Milan the choral singing of the Psalms. Up to that time, the holy Canticles had been given from the Ambo by the single voice of a Lector, but Ambrose, shut up in his Basilica with his people, takes the opportunity, and forms two choirs, bidding them respond to each other the verses of the Psalms. The people forgot their trouble in the delight of this heavenly music. Nay, the very howling of the tempest and the fierceness of the siege they were sustaining, added enthusiasm to this first exercise of their new privilege. Such was the chivalrous origin of Alternate Psalmody in the Western Church. Rome adopted the practice which Ambrose was the first to introduce, and which will continue to be observed to the end of time. During these hours of struggle with his enemies, the glorious Bishop has another gift with which to enrich the faithful people who are defending him at the risk of their own lives. Ambrose is a poet, and he has frequently sung, in verses full of sweetness and sublimity, the greatness of the God of the Christians, and the mysteries of man’s salvation. He now gives to his devoted people these hymns which he had only composed for his own private devotion. The Basilicas of Milan soon echoed these accents of the sublime soul which first uttered them. Later on, the whole Latin Church adopted them, and in honour of the holy Bishop who had thus opened one of the richest sources of the sacred Liturgy, a Hymn was for a long time called after his name, an Ambrosian. The Divine Office thus received a new mode of celebrating the divine praise, and the Church, the Spouse of Christ, possessed one means more of giving expression to the sentiments which animate her.
Thus our Hymns and the alternate singing of the Psalms are trophies of Ambrose’s victory. He had been raised up by God not for his own age only, but also for those which were to follow. Hence, the Holy Ghost infused into him the knowledge of Christian jurisprudence that he might be the defender of the rights of the Church at a period when paganism still lived, though defeated. And imperialism, or caesarism, had still the instinct, though not the uncontrolled power, to exercise its tyranny. Ambrose’s law was the Gospel, and he would acknowledge no law which was in opposition to that. He could not understand such imperial policy as that of ordering a Basilica to be given up to the Arians, for quietness’ sake! He would defend the inheritance of the Church. And in that defence, would shed the last drop of his blood. Certain courtiers dared to accuse him of tyranny: “No,” answered the Saint, “Bishops are not tyrants, but have often to suffer from tyranny.” The eunuch Calligonus, high chamberlain of the Emperor Valentinian II had said to Ambrose: “What! Dare you, in my presence, to care so little for Valentinian! I will cut off your head.” “I would it might be so,” answered Ambrose, “I should then die as a Bishop, and you would have done what eunuchs are wont to do.”
This noble courage in the defence of the rights of the Church showed itself even more clearly on another occasion. The Roman Senate, or rather that portion of the Senate which, though a minority, was still Pagan, was instigated by Symmachus, the Prefect of Rome, to ask the Emperor for the re-erection of the altar of Victory in the Capitol under the pretext of averting the misfortunes which threatened the empire. Ambrose, who had said to these politicians, “I hate the Religion of the Neros,” vehemently opposed this last effort of idolatry. He presented most eloquent petitions to Valentinian, in which he protested against an attempt whose object was to bring a Christian Prince to recognise that false doctrines have rights, and which would, if permitted to be tried, rob Him who is the one only Master of nations, of the victories which he had won. Valentinian yielded to these earnest remonstrances which taught him “that a Christian Emperor can only honour one Altar — the Altar of Christ,” and when the Senators had to receive their answer, the prince told them that Rome was his mother and he loved her, but that God was his Saviour, and he would obey Him. If the Empire of Rome had not been irrevocably condemned by God to destruction, the influence which Saint Ambrose had over such well-intentioned princes as Valentinian would probably have saved it. The Saint’s maxim to the Rulers of the world was this, though it was not to be realised in any of them until new kingdoms should spring up out of the ruins of the Roman Empire, and those new kingdoms and peoples organised by the Christian Church: but Saint Ambrose could have no other, and he therefore taught the Emperors of those times that “an Emperor’s grandest title is to be a Son of the Church. An Emperor is in the Church, he is not over her.”
It is beautiful to see the affectionate solicitude of Saint Ambrose for the young Emperor Gratian at whose death he shed floods of tears. How tenderly too did he not love Theodosius, that model Christian prince, for whose sake God retarded the fall of the Empire by the uninterrupted victory over all its enemies! On one occasion, indeed, this Son of the Church showed in himself the Pagan Caesar. But his holy father Ambrose, by a severity, which was inflexible because his affection for the culprit was great, brought him back to his duty and his God. “I loved,” says the holy Bishop in the funeral oration which he preached over Theodosius, “I loved this Prince who preferred correction to flattery. He stripped himself of his royal robes and publicly wept in the Church for the sin he had committed, and into which he had been led by evil counsel. In sighs and tears he sought to be forgiven. He, an Emperor, did what common men would be ashamed to do, he did public penance, and for the rest of his life he passed not a day without bewailing his sin.”
But we should have a very false idea of Saint Ambrose if we thought that he only turned his attention to affairs of importance like these, which brought him before the notice of the world. No pastor could be more solicitous than he about the slightest details which affected the interests of his flock. We have his life written by his deacon, Paulinus, who knew secrets which intimacy alone can know, and these fortunately he has revealed to us. Among other things, he tells us that when Ambrose heard confessions, he shed so many tears that the sinner was forced to weep: “You would have thought,” says Paulinus, “that they were his own sins that he was listening to.” We all know the tender paternal interest he felt for Augustine when he was a slave to error and his passions, and if we would have a faithful portrait of Ambrose, we must read in the Confessions of the Bishop of Hippo the fine passage where he expresses his admiration and gratitude for his spiritual father. Ambrose had told Monica that her son Augustine, who gave her so much anxiety, would be converted. That happy day at last came. It was Ambrose’s hand which immersed into the cleansing waters of Baptism him who was to be the prince of the Doctors of the Church.
A heart thus loyal in its friendship could not but be affectionate to those who were related by ties of blood. He tenderly loved his brother Satyrus, as we may see from the two funeral orations which he has left us upon this brother in which he speaks his praises with all the warmth of enthusiastic admiration. He had a sister, too, named Marcellina, who was equally dear to her saintly brother. From her earliest years, she had spurned the world and its pomps, and the position which she might expect to enjoy in it, as being a Patrician’s daughter. She had received the veil of virginity from the hands of Pope Liberius, but lived in her father’s house at Rome. Her brother Ambrose was separated from her, but he seemed to love her the more for that. And he communicated with her in her holy retirement by frequent letters, several of which are still extant. She deserved all the esteem which Ambrose had for her. She had a great love for the Church of God, and she was heart and soul in all the great undertakings of her brother the Bishop. The very heading of these letters shows the affection of the Saint: “The Brother to the Sister,” or, “To my sister Marcellina, dearer to me than my own eyes and life.” Then follows the letter, in a style of nerve and animation, well suited to the soul-stirring communications he had to make to her about his struggles. One of them was written in the midst of the storm, when the courageous Pontiff was besieged in his Basilica by Justina’s soldiers. His discourses to the people of Milan, his consolations and his trials, the heroic sentiments of his great soul, all is told in these despatches to his sister, and where every line shows how strong and holy was the attachment between Ambrose and Marcellina. The great Basilica of Milan still contains the tomb of the brother and sister: and over them both is daily offered the divine sacrifice.
Such was Ambrose, of whom Theodosius was one day heard to say: “There is but one Bishop in the world.” Let us glorify the Holy Spirit who has vouchsafed to produce this sublime model in the Church, and let us beg of the holy Pontiff to obtain for us, by his prayers, a share in that lively faith and ardent love which he himself had, and which he evinces in those delicious and eloquent writings, which he has left us on the mystery of the Incarnation. During these days, which are preparing us for the birth of our Incarnate Lord, Ambrose is one of our most powerful patrons. His love towards the Blessed Mother of God teaches us what admiration and devotion we ought to have for Mary. Saint Ephrem and Saint Ambrose are the two Fathers of the fourth century who are the most explicit upon the glories of the office and the person of the Mother of Jesus. To confine ourselves to Saint Ambrose, he had completely mastered this mystery, which he understood, and appreciated, and defined in his writings. Mary’s exemption from every stain of sin, Mary’s uniting herself at the foot of the Cross with her Divine Son for the salvation of the world, Jesus appearing after His resurrection, to Mary first of all — on these and so many other points Saint Ambrose has spoken so clearly as to deserve to be considered as one of the most prominent witnesses of the primitive traditions respecting the privileges and dignity of the holy Mother of God.
This his devotion to Mary explains SaintAmbrose’s enthusiastic admiration for the holy state of Christian Virginity, of which he might justly be called the Doctor. He surpasses all the Fathers in the beautiful and eloquent manner in which he speaks of the dignity and happiness of Virginity. Four of his writings are devoted to the praises of this sublime state. The Pagans would fain have an imitation of it, by instituting seven Vestal Virgins, whom they loaded with honours and riches, and to whom they in due time restored liberty. Saint Ambrose shows how contemptible these were, compared with the innumerable Virgins of the Christian Church who filled the whole world with the fragrance of their humility, constancy and disinterestedness. But on this magnificent subject his words were even more telling than his writings, and we learn from his contemporaries that when he went to preach in any town, mothers would not allow their daughters to be present at his sermon, lest this irresistible panegyrist of the eternal nuptials with the Lamb should convince them that that was the better part, and persuade them to make it the object of their desires.
The Greeks honour the memory of the great Bishop of Milan by Hymns replete with the most magnificent praises.
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We, also, O Immortal Ambrose, unworthy though we be to take a part in such a choir, we, too, will praise you! We will praise the magnificent ifts which our Lord bestowed on you. You are the Light of the Church and the Salt of the Earth by your heavenly teachings. You are the vigilant Pastor, the affectionate Father, the unyielding Pontiff. Oh how must your heart have loved that Jesus for whom we are now preparing! With what undaunted courage did you, at the risk of your life, resist them that blasphemed this Divine Word! Well indeed have you thereby merited to be made one of the Patrons of the faithful, to lead them, each year, to Him who is their Saviour and their King! Let, then, a ray of the truth, which filled you sublime soul while here on Earth, penetrate even into our hearts. Give us a relish of your sweet and eloquent writings. Get us a sentiment of devoted love for the Jesus who is so soon to be with us. Obtain for us, after your example, to take up His cause with energy against the enemies of our holy faith, against the spirits of darkness, and against ourselves. Let everything yield, let everything be annihilated, let every knee bow, let every heart confess itself conquered, in the presence of Jesus, the eternal Word of the Father, the Son of God, and the Son of Mary, our Redeemer, our Judge, our All.
Glorious Saint! humble us, as you did Theodosius. Raise us up again contrite and converted, as you lovingly raised up this your strayed sheep and carried him back to your fold. Pray, too, for the Catholic hierarchy of which you were one of the brightest ornaments. Ask of God, for the Priests and Bishops of His Church, that humble yet inflexible courage with which they should resist the Powers of the world, as often as they abuse the authority which God has put into their hands. “Let their face,” as our Lord Himself speaks, “become hard as adamant” (Ezechiel i. 9) against the enemies of the Church, and may they set themselves “as a wall for the house of Israel” (Ezechiel xiii. 5). May they consider it as the highest privilege and the greatest happiness to be permitted to expose their property, and peace, and life, for the liberty of this holy Spouse of Christ.
Valiant champion of the Truth, Arm yourself with your scourge which the Church has given you as your emblem, and drive far from the flock of Christ the wolves of the Arian tribe which, under various names, are even now prowling round the fold. Let our ears be no longer shocked with the blasphemies of these proud teachers who presume to scan, judge, approve and blame, by the measure of their vain conceits, the great God who has given them everything they are and have, and who, out of infinite love for His creatures, has deigned to humble Himself and become one of ourselves, although knowing that men would make this very condescension an argument for denying that he is God.
Remove our prejudices, O great lover of truth, and crush within us those time-serving and unwise theories which tend to make us Christians forget that Jesus is the King of this world and look on the law, which equally protects error and truth, as the perfection of modern systems. May we understand that the rights of the Son of God and His Church do not cease to exist because the world ceases to acknowledge them: that to give the same protection to the true religion and to those false doctrines which men have set up in opposition to the teaching of the Church, is to deny that all power has been given to Jesus in Heaven and on Earth, that those scourges which periodically come upon the world are the lessons which Jesus gives to those who trample on the rights of His Church, rights which He so justly acquired by dying on the Cross for all mankind, that, finally, though it be out of our power to restore those rights to people that have had the misfortune to resign them, yet it is our duty, under pain of being accomplices with those who would not have Jesus reign over them, to acknowledge that they are the rights of the Church.
And lastly, dear Saint, in the midst of the dark clouds which lower over the world, console our holy Mother the Church who is now but a stranger and pilgrim amid those nations which were her children, but have now denied her. May she cull the flowers of holy virginity among the faithful, and may that holy state be the attraction of those fortunate souls who understand how grand is the dignity of being a Spouse of Christ. If, at the very commencement of her ministry, during the ages of persecution, the holy Church could lead countless virgins to Jesus, may it be so even now in our own age of crime and sensuality. May those pure and generous hearts formed and consecrated to the Lamb by this holy Mother, become more and more numerous, and so give to her enemies this irresistible proof that she is not barren as they pretend, and that it is she that alone preserves the world from universal corruption, by leavening it with this angelic purity.
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Let us consider that last visible preparation for the coming of the Messiah: a universal Peace. The din of war is silenced and the entire world is intent in expectation. “There are three silences to be considered,” says Saint Bonaventure in one of his Sermons for Advent: “the first in the days of Noah, after the deluge had destroyed all sinners. The second in the days of Caesar Augustus when all nations were subjected to the empire. The third will be at the death of Antichrist, when the Jews will be converted.” O Jesus! Prince of Peace, you will that the world will be in peace when you are coming down to dwell in it. You foretold this by the Psalmist, your ancestor in the flesh, who speaking of you, said: “He will make wars to cease even to the end of the Earth. He will destroy the bow and break the weapons, and the shield he will burn in the fire” (Psalm xlv. 10). And why is this, O Jesus? It is that hearts which you are to visit must be silent and attentive. It is that before you enter a soul, you trouble it in thy great mercy, as the world was troubled and agitated before the universal peace, then you bring peace into that soul and you take possession of her. Oh! come quickly, dear Lord, subdue our rebellious senses, bring low the haughtiness of our spirit, crucify our flesh, rouse our hearts from their sleep: and then may your entrance into our souls be a feast day of triumph, as when a conqueror enters a city which he has taken after a long siege. Sweet Jesus, Prince of Peace, give us peace. Fix your kingdom so firmly in our hearts that you may reign in us forever.Also on this day according to the ROMAN MARTYROLOGY:
At Alexandria, the birthday of blessed Agatho, soldier. In the persecution of Decius, as he was preventing some people from insulting the bodies of the martyrs, a sudden outcry was raised against him by all the populace, and being brought before the judge and persisting in the confession of Christ, he was condemned to capital punishment as a reward for his humanity.
At Antioch, the holy martyrs Polycarp and Theodore.
At Tuburbum in Africa, during the persecution of the Vandals under the Arian king Hunneric, St. Servus, martyr, who, being for a very long time beaten with rods, lifted up on high with pulleys and suddenly dropped on flint-stones with his whole weight, and rubbed over with sharp stones, obtained the palm of martyrdom.
At Teano in Campania, St. Urban, bishop and confessor.
At Saintes in France, St. Martin, abbot, at whose tomb God works frequent miracles.
In the diocese of Meaux, St. Fara, virgin.
And in other places, many other holy martyrs, confessors and virgins.
Thanks be to God.
