Part 22 (1/2)

Although not yet a disciple of our Lord, he bore him no illwill, and held his person in secret veneration. He was naturally grave and composed, and when he came to Golgotha to relieve guard, he kept order on all sides, and forced everybody to behave at least with common decency, down to the moment when truth triumphed over him, and he rendered public testimony to the Divinity of Jesus. Being a rich man, and a volunteer, he had no difficulty in resigning his post at once. He a.s.sisted at the descent from the Cross and the burial of our Lord, which put him into familiar connection with the friends of Jesus, and after the day of Pentecost he was one of the first to receive baptism in the Pool of Bethsaida, where he took the name of Ctesiphon. He had a brother living in Arabia, to whom he related the miracles he had beheld, and who was thus called to the path of salvation, came to Jerusalem, was baptised by the name of Cecilius, and was charged, together with Ctesiphon, to a.s.sist the deacons in the newly-formed Christian community.

Ctesiphon accompanied the Apostle St. James the Greater into Spain, and also returned with him. After a time, he was again sent into Spain by the Apostles, and carried there the body of St. James, who had been martyred at Jerusalem. He was made a bishop, and resided chiefly in a sort of island or peninsula at no great distance from France, which he also visited, and where he made some disciples. The name of the place where he lived was rather like Vergui, and it was afterwards laid waste by an inundation. I do not remember that Ctesiphon was ever martyred.

He wrote several books containing details concerning the Pa.s.sion of Christ; but there have been some books falsely attributed to him, and others, which were really from his pen, ascribed to different writers.

Rome has since rejected these books, the greatest part of which were apocryphal, but which nevertheless did contain some few things really from his pen. One of the guards of our Lord's sepulchre, who would not let himself be bribed by the Jews, was his fellow countryman and friend. His name was something like Sulei or Suleii. After being detained some time in prison, he retired into a cavern of Mount Sinai, where he lived seven years. G.o.d bestowed many special graces upon this man, and he wrote some very learned books in the style of Denis the Areopagite. Another writer made use of his works, and in this manner some extracts from them have come down to us. Everything concerning these facts was made known to me, as well as the name of the book, but I have forgotten it. This countryman of Ctesiphon, afterwards followed him into Spain. Among the companions of Ctesiphon in that country were this brother Cecilius, and some other men, whose name were Intalecius, Hesicius, and Euphrasius. Another Arab, called Sulima, was converted in the very early days of the Church, and a fellow countryman of Ctesiphon, with a name like Sulensis, became a Christian later, in the time of the deacons.

THE END.

1 Anne Catherine's visions clearly fall in the category of private revelation. Sacred Scripture and Sacred Tradition are infallible; private revelation is fallible. However, her visions are neither mere human meditations nor pious fiction. Her account of events in the lives of Jesus and Mary were revealed to her by G.o.d. Although G.o.d cannot err in anything He does, errors can be introduced into private revelation by a misunderstanding on the part of the person who receives the revelation, or by an error made by the person who writes down or transmits the revelation. Sacred Scripture and Sacred Tradition are immune from these types of error; private revelation is not. Anne Catherine's visions come from G.o.d, but they are fallible because they come to us through fallible human persons.

2 Her name in German, her native language, is Anna Katharina Emmerick. With the decree of April 24, 2001, the servant of G.o.d Anna Katharina Emmerick has been awarded the degree of heroic virtue (Decretum super virtutibus), with which she has been awarded by Church practice the t.i.tle ”Venerable.”

3 In more modern times, holy persons who also had the stigmata include: Audrey Marie Santo (Worcester, Ma.s.sachusetts), Venerable Padre Pio of Pietrelcina, Venerable Anna Maria Taigi, Theresa Neumann, and many others.

4 In her book, The Life of Jesus Christ and Biblical Revelations, Anne Catherine Emmerich details the events of the 31/2-year Ministry of Jesus Christ. Although she explicitly states that Christ's Ministry lasted 31/2 years (Vol. 1, p. 496), the astute reader of that work will notice a gap of about one year.

5 She here again explained the manner in which the families a.s.sembled together, and in what numbers. But the writer has forgotten her words.

6 She was not certain that the Blessed Sacrament was administered in that order, for on another occasion she had seen John the last to receive.

7 It was not without surprise that the editor, some years after these things had been related by Sister Emmerich, read, in the Latin edition of the Roman Catechism (Mayence, Muller), in reference to the Sacrament of Confirmation, that, according to the tradition of the holy pope Fabian, Jesus taught his Apostles in what manner they were to prepare the Holy Chrism, after the inst.i.tution of the Blessed Sacrament. The Pope says expressly, in the 54th paragraph of his Second Epistle to the Bishops of the East: 'Our predecessors received from the Apostles and delivered to us that our Saviour Jesus Christ, after having made the Last Supper with his Apostles and washed their feet, taught them how to prepare the Holy Chrism.'

8 On the 11th of December 1812, in her visions of the public life of Jesus, she saw our Lord permit the devils whom he had expelled from the men of Gergesa to enter into a herd of swine, she also saw, on this particular occasion that the possessed men first overturned a large vat filled with some fermented liquid.

9 Dulmen is a small town in Westphalia, where Sister Emmerich lived at this time.

10 Mary of Heli is often spoken of in this relation. According to Sister Emmerich, she was the daughter of St. Joachim and St. Anne, and was born nearly twenty years before the Blessed Virgin. She was not the child of promise, and is called Mary of Heli, by which she is distinguished from the other of the same name, because she was the daughter of Joachim, or Heliachim. Her husband bore the name of Cleophas, and her daughter that of Mary of Cleophas. This daughter was, however, older than her aunt, the Blessed Virgin, and had been married first to Alpheus, by whom she had three sons, afterwards the Apostles Simon, James the Less and Thaddeus. She had one son by her second husband, Sabat, and another called Simon, by her third husband, Jonas.