Mar Charbel
Posted on 07/23/2006 3:33:49 PM PDT by NYer
Antoun Makhlouf was born in 1828, in Bekaa Kafra (North Lebanon). He had a true Christian upbringing, which had given him a passion for prayer. Then he followed his two hermit uncles in the hermitage of the St Antonious Kozhaya monastery and was converted to monastic and hermetical life.
In 1851, he left his family village and headed for the Our Lady of Maifouk monastery to spend his first monastic year, and then he went to the St Maron monastery in Annaya, where he entered the Maronite Order, carrying the name Charbel, a name of one of the Antioch church martyrs of the second century. On November 1st. 1853, he exposed his ceremonial vows in St Maron’s monastery - Annaya. Then he completed his theological studies in the St Kobrianous and Justina monastery in Kfifan, Batroun.
He was ordained a priest in Bkerky, the Maronite Patriarchate, on July 23rd, 1859. He lived 16 years in the St Maron's monastery – Annaya. From there, he entered, on February 15th, 1875, the St Peter & Paul hermitage, which belongs to the monastery. He was a typical saint and hermit, who spent his time praying and worshipping. Rarely had he left the hermitage where he followed the way of the saintly hermits in prayers, life and practice.
St Charbel lived in the hermitage for 23 years. On December 16th, 1898 he was struck with an illness while performing the holy mass. He died on Christmas' eve, December 24th, 1898, and was buried in the St Maron monastery cemetery in Annaya.
Few months later, dazzling lights were seen around the grave. From there, his corpse, which had been secreting sweat and blood, was transferred into a special coffin. Hordes of pilgrims started swarming the place to get his intercession. And through this intercession, God blessed many people with recovery and spiritual graces.
In 1925, his beatification and canonization were proposed for declaration by Pope Pious XI. In 1950, the grave was opened in the presence of an official committee which included doctors who verified the soundness of the body. After the grave had been opened and inspected, the variety of healing incidents amazingly multiplied. A multitude of pilgrims from different religious facets started flocking to the Annaya monastery to get the saint's intercession.
Prodigies reached beyond the Lebanese borders. This unique phenomenon caused a moral revolution, the return to faith and the reviving of the virtues of the soul.
Father of Truth
(The Last Prayer of Saint Charbel before he died)
Father of truth,
Here is your Son,
The sacrifice in which you are well pleased.
Accept him for he died for me.
So through him I shall be pardoned.
Here is the offering.
Take it from my hands
And so I shall be reconciled with you.
Remember not the sins that I have committed
In front of your Majesty.
Here is the blood which flowered on Golgotha
For my salvation and prays for me.
Out of consideration for this,
Accept my supplication.
I have committed many sins
But your mercy is great.
If you put them in the balance,
Your goodness will have more weight
Than the most mighty mountains.
Look not upon my sins,
But rather on what is offered for them,
For the offering and the sacrifice
Are even greater than the offences.
Because I have sinned,
Your beloved bore the nails and the spear.
His sufferings are enough to satisfy you.
By them I shall live.
Glory be to the Father who sent His Son for us.
Adoration be to the Son who has freed us and ensured our salvation.
Blessed be he who by his love has given life to all.
To him be the glory.
from the Maronite Liturgy.
Oh yeah! I forgot about that! I have an icon of St. Charbel on my wall. Thanks for the thread!
Amen.
That's so beautiful.
St. Charbel pray for us!
I would suspect that this happens with St. Sharbel's feast day too. (That's the way they spell it in Portland.)
No. Today is his feast and we celebrated a special liturgy developed around the life of this saint. The Sedro and Mazmooro prayers, as well as the opening and closing hymns, introduce the Christ like qualities of St. Charbel. Quite beautiful!
On Wednesday, we will complete our novena and celebrate another beautiful liturgy developed around St. Ann. Our church has been full of Roman Catholics each night throughout the novena. They love this saint and especially our Novena in her honor.
The only other special liturgy we celebrate is in honor of St. Maron, for whom our Church is named. His feast day is on February 9 and it is a Feast Day of Obligation.
As for the spelling - Charbel vs Sharbel - both are correct. They are transliterations of the Arabic. We see these different spellings quite often with the Maronite hymns that have been written using the Latin alphabet.
If I'm not mistaken, Saint Charbel (Sharbel) appears on the Latin calendar of saints, sometime in December. We follow the Maronite calendar.
Yes, I remember when you purchased it. You were quite pleased with the final product. I have a framed graphic on my wall, a reminder to follow his example, excluding the hair shirt ;-)
Do you know what the word, "Mar" or "mar" means?
Thanks.
It means saint.
St. Charbel from Lebanon? I trust he is! Amazing timing in this great big universe, isn't it?
With all the venom, rage and hatred of Islam, Muslims, Arabs and such on this site, it's very nice to read about this marvelous Lebanese Arab Christian saint.
Beautiful prayer from the Maronite Liturgy.
I turn to the "religion" forum whenever the main forum gets too hate-filled. There's one thread with over 1000 replies, mostly raging at Muslims and Islam.
It's not a good thing to read too much of that. It's a poison that infects the reader after a while, I think.
Thanks for posting it.
Good news! The Latin Rite honors his feast day on today, Monday. Checked the calendar.
bttt
Hi NYer, biggirl once again. Do you remember when I had posted posts about one of my favorite shows on EWTN, the one on Sunday nights of Archbishop Fulton Sheen? Well I came upon this online article about a miracle that came about because of his prayers to God from Heaven. Here is the article and if you want to make a seperate thread from it, fine because you can put a thread together and the way you go about confuses me. Thanks.
http://www.pjstar.com/stories/072406/TRI_BAFKTU2R.041.shtml
Enjoy the reading and take care.
Thank you for the link and I will post the thread. Enjoy your day!
Father Charbel spent the night before Christmas, 1898 in church, following his usual custom of twenty-three years, ever since he became a hermit at the hermitage of Saints Peter and Paul on the mountain of Annaya. He did not waver from this praiseworthy custom. But that last night, he was lying down, neither awake, nor praying, nor meditating; he was asleep, sleeping the sleep of death. His soul, however, was with God, quite awake, in the eternal awakening. This was the last night Father Charbel would spend in the church of Saints Peter and Paul. Contrary to his custom and for the first time, Father Charbel was lying on the floor, over the mat of hair, with his face exposed.
Please note that people never saw his face when he was alive. He always kept his head down in church, at work or when walking, always looking to the ground. He would lift his eyes only to heaven. When in church, he always faced the altar with his eyes fixed on the tabernacle. However, when he died and was Lying face upward, his eyes were closed, still not looking at anyone, exactly as in his lifetime. Holding vigil at the body of the Servant of God in church, were his companions of the hermitage, Father Macarius Mishmshany, and Brother Francis of Artaba, along with a group of monks from the monastery of St. Maron. As soon as they learned of the passing of Father Charbel they rushed to the hermitage to kiss his hands and to be blessed by touching his body while bidding him farewell. Many spent most of the night kneeling near him, praying.
The snow was coming down heavily, accumulating on the hermitage and on the neighboring mountains and valleys. It was extremely cold and windy, to a degree that those keeping vigil around the saintly remains were trembling from the severity of the cold. And no wonder. The altitude of the hermitage is one thousand and four hundred meters above sea level, on a high summit exposed to the wind.
Those keeping vigil were asking one another, "If we are suffering so much for only one night in this severe winter, how was Father Charbel able to live twenty-three years here spending every night of his life, kneeling on bamboo, in pain from midnight until the time of his Mass at 9:00 o'clock in the morning, fasting and immobile as the stone statue erected on the floor before the altar. Truly, this hermit was a saint. He endured fatigue, hunger, poverty and cold with the courage of a martyr. Every minute of his life was martyrdom, without complaint. No doubt he is now finding the reward of his marvelous martyrdom, with God."
Through prayer and penance he offered himself as a sacrifice so that the world would return to God.
EWTN GALLERY: July 24 ~ 28 THEME: The Maronite Trilogy
This is an excellent introduction to the Maronite Rite for Latin Rite Catholics who may be unfamiliar with who the Maronites are and how they ‘fit in’ with the rest of the Catholic Church. Host Jan Marie Halphen interviews Maronite priest Fr. Nabil Mouannes.
EWTN GALLERY
THE MARONITE TRILOGY: EP. 01 (30:00) NEW
St. Maron and Maronite Rite
Monday July 24, 2006 3:00 AM
Monday July 24, 2006 6:30 PM
EWTN GALLERY
THE MARONITE TRILOGY: EP. 02 (30:00) NEW
The Maronite Saints
Tuesday July 25, 2006 3:00 AM
Tuesday July 25, 2006 6:30 PM
EWTN GALLERY
THE MARONITE TRILOGY: EP. 03 (30:00) NEW
Contemplative prayer life of the Maronite Saints
Wednesday July 26, 2006 3:00 AM
Wednesday July 26, 2006 6:30 PM
What you are posting is the story of a very humble saint. Also this is a reminder that those of us who are Christian believers are call to pray and fast during this most diffcult time.
Would you believe I got up at 3am to watch the first installment! It was a letdown, unfortunately. The trilogy was probably done with a low budget.
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