Saturday, June 29, 2013

When I think of the ideal man, I think of this Saint-King elected to lead the First Crusade

St. Ladislaus (or Ladislas)


St. Ladislaus the First, called by the Hungarians László, and in old French, Lancelot, was son of Bela king of Hungary, and born in 1041. By the pertinacious importunity of the people he was compelled, much against his own inclination, to ascend the throne in 1080, the kingdom being then elective.
He restored the good laws and discipline which St. Stephen had established, and which seem to have been obliterated by the confusion of the times. Chastity, meekness, gravity, charity, and piety were from his infancy the distinguishing parts of his character; avarice and ambition were his sovereign aversion, so perfectly had the maxims of the gospel extinguished in him all propensity to those base passions. His life in the palace was most austere: he was frugal and abstemious, but most liberal to the Church and poor. Vanity, pleasure, or idle amusements had no share in his actions or time, because all his moments were consecrated to the exercises of religion and the duties of his station, in which he had only the divine will in view, and sought only God’s greater honor.
He watched over a strict and impartial administration of justice, was generous and merciful to his enemies, and vigorous in the defense of his country and the Church. He added to his kingdom Dalmatia and Croatia, drove the Huns out of his territories, and vanquished the Poles, Russians, and Tartars.
He was preparing to command as general-in-chief, the great expedition of the Christians against the Saracens for the recovery of the Holy Land, when God called him to himself on the 30th of July, 1095. He was buried at Waradin, where his relics continue “still to be illustrated by miracles,” says the Roman Martyrology, on the 27th of June, on which day, on account of their translation, it celebrates his festival. He was canonized by Celestine III in 1198.
(from Lives of the Fathers, Martyrs, and Other Principal Saints, by Rev. Alban Butler, Vol VI, John Murphy Publisher, 1821, pp 348-349).

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