Christian Heroes

KATHERINE DREXEL


(1858-1955). At the turn of the century in Philadelphia, a young Catholic socialite developed an interest in helping impoverished Black and Native American families in the U.S., and the people of Haiti; she directly asked the Pope to provide missionaries to help those communities. He responded by suggesting she herself become the needed missionary. She did. Using the inheritance of Wall Street powerhouse Drexel Burnham, she devoted her life to quietly helping America’s poor. Her petition is pending today in the Vatican to become America’s second Roman Catholic saint.

DOROTHY DAY

(1897-1980). Dorothy Day was founder of The Catholic Worker in 1933. Day was an American journalist and reformer, born and raised in Brooklyn, who converted to Catholicism at the age of 30, and worked mostly on the Lower East Side where she lived among the poor and fought for social justice. This American pacifist and advocate for the poor may become the third Roman Catholic saint from America. The Catholic Worker aimed at uniting workers and intellectuals in joint efforts to improve farming, education, and social conditions.

Joan of Arc, c.1412-1431


The French patriot and martyr, Joan of Arc, was born the daughter of well-off peasants at Domrémy, a hamlet on the borders of Lorraine and Champagne, January 6. The English conquered the area in 1421 but their forces withdrew in 1424. Joan received no formal education but was endowed with an argumentative nature and shrewd common senses.

At the age of thirteen she thought she heard the voices of St. Michael, St. Catherine and St. Margaret bidding her rescue the Paris region from English domination. She presented herself before the local commander, Robert de Baudricourt, and persuaded him, after he had had her exorcised, to take her across the English-occupied territory to the dauphin at Chinon, which they reached March 6, 1429. According to legend, Joan was called into a gathering of courtiers, among them the dauphin in disguise, and her success in identifying him at once was interpreted as divine confirmation of his previously doubted legitimacy and claims to the throne. She was equally successful in ecclesiastical examination to which she was subjected at Poitiers and was consequently allowed to join the army assembled at Blois for the relief of Orleans. Clad in a suit of white armor and flying her own standard, she entered Orleans with an advance guard on April 29 and by May 8 forced the English to raise the siege and retire in June from the principal stronghold on the Loire.

To further aid French resistance, Joan took the dauphin with an army of 12,000 through English-held territory to be crowned Charles VII in Rheims cathedral on July 17, 1429. She then found it difficult to persuade him to undertake further military exploits, especially the relief of Paris. At last she set out on her own to relieve Compiègne from the Burgundians, was captured in a skirmish and sold to the English by John of Luxembourg for 10,000 crowns. She was put on trial (February 21-May 17, 1431) on charges of heresy and sorcery by an ecclesiastical court of the Inquisition, presided over by Pierre Cauchon, Bishop of Beauvais.

Most of what we know about Joan's brief life are those preserved in the records of her trial. She was found guilty, taken out to the churchyard of St. Ouen on May 24 to be burnt, but at the last moment broke down and made a wild recantation. This she later abjured and suffered her martyrdom at the stake in the marketplace of Rouen on May 30, faithful to her \"voices.\" The apparitor of the archiepiscopal court, Maugier Leparmentier, was present and recorded that:

The day when Joan was burned, the wood was got ready to burn her before the sermon was finished or the sentence had been pronounced. And no sooner the sentence uttered by the bishop, without any delay, she was taken to the fire, and I did not see that there was any sentence pronounced by the lay judge. But was at once taken to the fire. And in the fire she cried more than six times \"Jesus,\" and above all with her last breath she cried in a loud voice \"Jesus!\" so that all present could hear her. Almost all wept with pity, and I have heard say that the ashes, after her burning, were gathered up and cast into the Seine.

The usher, Jean Massieu, added that:

The pious woman asked, requested, and begged me, as I was near her at her end, that I would go to the near-by church and fetch the cross to hold it raised right before her eyes until the threshold of death, that the cross with God hung upon be continually before her eyes in her lifetime. Being in the flames she ceased not until the end to proclaim and confess aloud the holy name of Jesus, imploring and invoking without cease the help of the saints in paradise. And what is more, in giving up the ghost and bowing her head, uttered to name of Jesus as a sign that she was fervent in the faith of God.

In 1456, in order to strengthen the validity of Charles VII's coronation, the trial was declared irregular. In 1904 she was designated Venerable, declared Blessed in 1908 and finally canonized in 1920.

http://www.historyguide.org/ancient/joan.html

HEROES OF FOLKLORE

1) The hero is begotten.
2) He is born.
3) His youth is threatened.
4) He is brought up.
5) He often acquires invulnerability.
6) He fights with the dragon or other monsters.
7) He wins a maiden, usually after overcoming great dangers.
He makes and expedition to the underworld.
9) He returns to the land from which he was once banished and conquers his enemies.
10) He dies.

BIBLICAL HEROES

1) The old man (life of sin, worldly life...)
2) Hero`s conversion.
3) Hero`s conversion.
4) Hero`s conversion.
5) The new man (mild character of the hero.)
6) The struggles (against idolatry or the Roman Empire... .)
7) Chastity of the hero.
The struggles against idolatry or the Roman Empire... .
9) The hero dies, or is taken.
10) The afterlife of the achievement of the hero after figures in the religion of ancient Israel, but they were portrayed in a special way which put them afore and exalted them high.

A hero works always in a special situation of crisis; the narrative technique portrays the figure in such a way that it should respond to a special challenge. Although both heroes are charismatic, the Biblical figure is said to have the Spirit of the Lord upon him. His deeds testify to the nature of that Lord. The death of the hero is the climax of the narrative. By his death the hero testifies to the fact that he offers his whole life as sacrifice on the altar of the message he proclaimed.

OLD TESTAMENT HEROES


Hebrews 11
By Faith
1Now faith is being sure of what we hope for and certain of what we do not see. 2This is what the ancients were commended for.
3By faith we understand that the universe was formed at God's command, so that what is seen was not made out of what was visible. 4By faith Abel offered God a better sacrifice than Cain did. By faith he was commended as a righteous man, when God spoke well of his offerings. And by faith he still speaks, even though he is dead.

5By faith Enoch was taken from this life, so that he did not experience death; he could not be found, because God had taken him away. For before he was taken, he was commended as one who pleased God. 6And without faith it is impossible to please God, because anyone who comes to him must believe that he exists and that he rewards those who earnestly seek him.

7By faith Noah, when warned about things not yet seen, in holy fear built an ark to save his family. By his faith he condemned the world and became heir of the righteousness that comes by faith.

8By faith Abraham, when called to go to a place he would later receive as his inheritance, obeyed and went, even though he did not know where he was going. 9By faith he made his home in the promised land like a stranger in a foreign country; he lived in tents, as did Isaac and Jacob, who were heirs with him of the same promise. 10For he was looking forward to the city with foundations, whose architect and builder is God.

11By faith Abraham, even though he was past age—and Sarah herself was barren—was enabled to become a father because he[a]considered him faithful who had made the promise. 12And so from this one man, and he as good as dead, came descendants as numerous as the stars in the sky and as countless as the sand on the seashore.

13All these people were still living by faith when they died. They did not receive the things promised; they only saw them and welcomed them from a distance. And they admitted that they were aliens and strangers on earth. 14People who say such things show that they are looking for a country of their own. 15If they had been thinking of the country they had left, they would have had opportunity to return. 16Instead, they were longing for a better country—a heavenly one. Therefore God is not ashamed to be called their God, for he has prepared a city for them.

17By faith Abraham, when God tested him, offered Isaac as a sacrifice. He who had received the promises was about to sacrifice his one and only son, 18even though God had said to him, \"It is through Isaac that your offspring will be reckoned.\"[c] 19Abraham reasoned that God could raise the dead, and figuratively speaking, he did receive Isaac back from death.

20By faith Isaac blessed Jacob and Esau in regard to their future.

21By faith Jacob, when he was dying, blessed each of Joseph's sons, and worshiped as he leaned on the top of his staff.

22By faith Joseph, when his end was near, spoke about the exodus of the Israelites from Egypt and gave instructions about his bones.

23By faith Moses' parents hid him for three months after he was born, because they saw he was no ordinary child, and they were not afraid of the king's edict.

24By faith Moses, when he had grown up, refused to be known as the son of Pharaoh's daughter. 25He chose to be mistreated along with the people of God rather than to enjoy the pleasures of sin for a short time. 26He regarded disgrace for the sake of Christ as of greater value than the treasures of Egypt, because he was looking ahead to his reward. 27By faith he left Egypt, not fearing the king's anger; he persevered because he saw him who is invisible. 28By faith he kept the Passover and the sprinkling of blood, so that the destroyer of the firstborn would not touch the firstborn of Israel.

29By faith the people passed through the Red Sea[d] as on dry land; but when the Egyptians tried to do so, they were drowned.

30By faith the walls of Jericho fell, after the people had marched around them for seven days.

31By faith the prostitute Rahab, because she welcomed the spies, was not killed with those who were disobedient.[e]

32And what more shall I say? I do not have time to tell about Gideon, Barak, Samson, Jephthah, David, Samuel and the prophets, 33who through faith conquered kingdoms, administered justice, and gained what was promised; who shut the mouths of lions, 34quenched the fury of the flames, and escaped the edge of the sword; whose weakness was turned to strength; and who became powerful in battle and routed foreign armies. 35Women received back their dead, raised to life again. Others were tortured and refused to be released, so that they might gain a better resurrection. 36Some faced jeers and flogging, while still others were chained and put in prison. 37They were stoned[f]; they were sawed in two; they were put to death by the sword. They went about in sheepskins and goatskins, destitute, persecuted and mistreated— 38the world was not worthy of them. They wandered in deserts and mountains, and in caves and holes in the ground.

39These were all commended for their faith, yet none of them received what had been promised. 40God had planned something better for us so that only together with us would they be made perfect.