p. 236Honours After Death

From the day of St. Alonso’s burial, the Chapel in which his remains reposed, at Montesion, became a place of pilgrimage, and was for many years a source of constantly-recurring miraculous favours. Nor were the miracles confined to the Island of Majorca. In Spain and Flanders, in far-off Mexico¹1Letter of Father Gil, 1622, then Provincial of Aragon; v. Vita di S. Alfonso, P. Bonavenia. and Peru,²2In 1626, on account of the generous contributions of the faithful at Lima to the new chapel of the Saint, a relic of St. Alonso was sent to that city. V. Recopilacion de lo que si hallan tocante al V.H. Alonso R., MS. Montesion. wherever the fame of our Saint’s virtues had reached, God glorified His humble servant by miracles which were attested to by sworn witnesses, before official judges appointed by the Holy See to examine into their truth. Numberless Masses were said in the Chapel, candles were continually burning at his tomb, and soon the walls around were covered with the ex-votos and paintings representing the miracles which had been wrought; signs of devotion so familiar to the pilgrim in Catholic lands.

Father Gil, the former Rector of Montesion, who visited the College officially as Provincial, not long after the death of our Saint, declared in the process of canonization, that he found some two hundred of these ex-votos, all counted, around the tomb of St. Alonso. Many of these still exist at Montesion.³3V. “Month.” Dec. 1888, p. 550.

Such universal manifestations of devotion urged Father Julian, the Rector, to obtain from the Bishop of Majorca, Fray Simon Bauza, that an official inquiry should be made into the virtues and miracles of our Saint. A similar investigation had already been set on foot at Segovia by the Bishop of that city, in 1618. Accordingly the process was begun at Palma, in 1619. Long before the investigation was concluded, so convinced was the Bishop of Majorca of the sanctity of our Saint, that he authorised a painting of the Saint, in which he was represented in prayer before an apparition of his Immaculate Queen, to be solemnly placed over the tomb; and this was done by two of the Canons of the Cathedral in presence of a number of the nobility of the island. The exposition of a picture of one who has not been beatified, as an object of veneration, is now prohibited; but the Bishop’s authorisation was not in any way against any ecclesiastical laws of that period.

In 1622 the processes of Majorca and of Segovia were officially laid before the Sacred Congregation of Rites, and on March 22nd, in 1625, at the request of Philip IV., of Spain, and at that of all the estates of Majorca, this Congregation published a decree declaring that, on the strength of the two processes, the examination of witnesses might be proceeded with in the cause of canonization, which was now to be undertaken by Papal authority.

But this process, like so many others, was fated to be arrested by the new legislation of Urban VIII. In fact, a decree of that pope had been actually published just nine days before the one just cited. By this, any and every sign of public honour—cultus—to those who died in the odour of sanctity, was strictly forbidden; “unless they had been canonized, or had been venerated, either by common consent of the Church, or from time immemorial, or were spoken of as Saints in the writings of the Fathers and holy personages, or had been so honoured through ignorance, and with the tolerance, during a very long period, of the Holy See, or of the Bishop of the Diocese.” Though none of these exceptions told explicitly in favour of the honours paid to St. Alonso, it was considered that the new decree did not hold in our Saint’s regard, owing to the subsequent decrees of the same year,⁴4V. Boll., p. 594; nn. 39, 40; cf. supra. authorising the prosecution of the cause.

In the December of the very same year, 1625, Urban VIII. signed the commission for the introduction of the cause by which our Saint obtained the title of Venerable; in the October of the following year, 1626, the good news of the authorisation of the two apostolic processes reached the cities of Palma and Segovia. The cause was concluded in Majorca on August 23rd, 1628, and that of Segovia on July 14, 1630.

In 1631, the Fathers of the College of Montesion began a stately Chapel, to the left of the nave, as a place where Holy Communion could be given on days when sermons were going on in the Church. But its ultimate destination was to be the sanctuary to which the relics of St. Alonso were to be translated as soon as his Beatification, which then seemed so near at hand, should be proclaimed. Money flowed in so abundantly that the building grew in dimensions and richness far beyond the intentions of those who had commenced it. The numerous wonders wrought in answer to the Saint’s intercession fully realised the promise made to him during life, and from far and near offerings were sent for the erection of the Chapel.

Two years later, in 1633, the Council General of Majorca, by a solemn and public act, chose Alonso as one of the special patrons of their city and island. A solemn annual festival was decreed in his honour, and for 200 years the Majorcans faithfully celebrated it, through days of war, as in days of peace, until the triumph of the Revolutionary principles and the suppression of the religious houses, in 1835, allowed the memory of St. Alonso to be almost forgotten in the island.⁵5V. Breve reseña de las reliquias del Beato Alonso, &c. P. Mir S.J., Palma, 1877, from which the chief facts in this chapter are taken.

To the deep disappointment of all concerned, a new decree of Urban VIII., in 1634, forbade the Congregation of Rites to proceed with any causes of canonization and beatification, until fifty years had elapsed after the death of the candidate for the Church’s honours. This would have delayed the examination of the cause of St. Alonso till 1667.

There was, however, a saving clause in the decree, by which those processes which had been introduced previous to its publication might be resumed before the time specified; but this could only be done by express permission of the Pope. This permission was obtained; new difficulties, however, arose. A fresh brief, insisting on the faithful carrying out of his former orders, was published by Urban VIII. on June 5th, 1634, as to the cessation of all signs of honour to deceased persons, however holy had been their life. In consequence of this, the Bishop, Fray John de Santander, published a pastoral letter, in which he complained that the order had not been strictly obeyed with regard to St. Alonso. The Fathers of Montesion respectfully defended their conduct, but promptly obeyed the orders of the Pope. Many years of delay ensued in consequence. But at length, in 1673, the customary preliminary of a commission to enquire into the non-cultus was issued to the then Bishop of Majorca. The members of the commission were able to give a favourable answer; and accordingly Innocent XI., in 1684, signed the order for a commission to take up the cause afresh.

In 1695, the Memorial, containing St. Alonso’s “Accounts of Conscience” or description of what had passed in his spiritual life, which has been so constantly cited in this work, and, fifteen years later, all the other writings of St. Alonso, were submitted to the searching scrutiny of the official examiners. It was only in 1717 that Clement XI. gave his solemn approval to the decision of the Congregation of Rites, which declared that nothing was to be found in our Saint’s works which would hinder his beatification. The slow and regular process then began in earnest. Congregation followed Congregation, and finally, in 1760, Clement XIII. published the decree, “that the virtues of the Venerable Alonso were proved to be of heroic degree.”

Nothing now practically stood in the way of the solemn decree of beatification, and the announcement was received with great enthusiasm at Majorca, where the faith was then bright and undimmed. The news reached Palma on the morning of June 21st, and was made known by the voice of every church bell in the city, and a “Te Deum” was chaunted that very evening in the Church of Montesion, in presence of the authorities of the city, as well as in the Church of St. Eulalia, within whose parish the Saint had lived for forty-seven years. That night the whole of Palma was illuminated. And a still more solemn service of thanksgiving was celebrated on the following Sunday in the splendid Cathedral, the Bishop Don Lawrence Despuig officiating.

But the storm, which had long been lowering, broke very shortly after, and the members of the Society of Jesus were expelled by Charles III. from the entire Spanish Dominions; while in 1773, the suppression of the Order put a stop for an indefinite time to the progress of the cause of our Saint.

When at length Pius VII. gave back to the Church the Society of Jesus, and the Fathers had returned in 1816 to their old home at Montesion, the cause of its holy Porter was again resumed. But the second expulsion of the Fathers, in 1820, again delayed its progress.

Restored once more, in 1823, the Religious rejoiced, together with the faithful people of Majorca, to learn that the two miracles, which had been long and carefully investigated as a necessary condition of the Beatification, had at last been approved by the Congregation of Rites. And they learned, too, that the Pontiff, Leo XII., on the 31st of July, 1824, after hearing Mass in the Gesù—the Church wherein repose the relics of St. Ignatius Loyola—had solemnly published, in the adjacent Hall of the “Congregation of Gentlemen,” the approval of the decree of the Congregation.

In alluding to the choice of St. Ignatius’ feast for this declaration, the Holy Father said, “We choose that day to show, by new and marvellous proofs, that the holiness of that Order, founded by St. Ignatius—and now again reconstituted for the glory of God, the benefit of the Church, for the propagation and defence of the Church, for the education of Christian youth, and the restoring of piety—is every day growing and increasing with fresh youth and vigour.”⁶6Instit. S.J., Litt. Apost., Florence, 1886, p. 349.

At last the Decree of Beatification was finally published on May 20th, 1825, and the celebration of the Beatification was fixed to take place in St. Peter’s on the 12th of June, the same year.⁷7V. Boll., p. 595.

As far back as 1656, to prevent any signs of special honour, the remains of St. Alonso had been removed from the Chapel of Our Lady, and buried underground in the sanctuary, between the communion rails and the splendid tomb of Fray Verí, the founder of the College.⁸8V. p. 83. Fray Verí, who died in 1599, was buried in the Sanctuary of Montesion, on the Gospel side, and a sumptuous monument was erected over him. V. “Month,” Nov., 1888. In 1722 it was feared lest the dampness of the soil would utterly destroy the relics, and they were accordingly taken up on the 9th of June, in presence of Father Sierra, the Visitor, of the Rector and the Community, and were carried by them reverently in the old coffins, to the room in which he died, “in the lower passage, next to the muniment room.”⁹9V. p. 27; cf. Boll., p. 598, n. 54. On being opened, the two external wooden coffins, and even the leaden case within, were found to have suffered greatly from the damp, while the bones were covered with slime and with the remains of the winding sheet. The skeleton was then almost entire.

On the eleventh of the same month the precious remains were placed in a new leaden case, lined with green silk, and reverently deposited in a stone vault fashioned in the floor of the room in which St. Alonso had died. On the expulsion of the Fathers of the Society from Spain in 1767, at the strong representations of the City Council, the Marquis de Alos, the Government Commissioner for the property of the Jesuits, determined, with the approval of Don Garrido de la Vega, the Bishop of Majorca, to entrust the relics of St. Alonso to the Rector of the new university which was to occupy the College of Montesion. An exact list of all the manuscripts and other properties of the Saint was drawn up, and it is owing to this precaution that, during the many violent changes through which Spain has passed since that time, everything has been most safely preserved.

A fresh list was drawn up during the French War, when, in 1812, the College of Montesion was turned into Barracks. Two years after, when, on the restoration of the Society, the College and Church were handed over to the members of the revived Society, the precious treasure, the body of the Saint, with all its accompanying relics, came once again into the hands of his Brethren. The Fathers, after having been expelled for a third time, in 1820, as we have already seen, were again restored by Royal Decree three years later, and a fresh inspection of the relics took place on the 24th of September, 1825, with a view to the approaching Beatification. The bones were then arranged in their natural order, and, as is often the case with the remains of Saints, the skull and the bones were enclosed in a waxen effigy.

On the day fixed by Leo XII., the 12th of June, 1825, the faithful of the Eternal City were invited to take part in the magnificent ceremonial of the Beatification in the Basilica of St. Peter. Over the central entrance of the portico, there was a large painting, representing St. Alonso on the slopes of Bellver when our Lady wiped his brows; while over the chair of St. Peter, surrounded by rays of glory, was a veiled picture of the Saint. When, in the presence of the Cardinals and Consultors of the Congregation of Rites and the crowds there present, the Brief of the Beatification was read, the curtain dropped and disclosed the painting, representing the humble lay-Brother in glory, while the chant of a solemn Te Deum rose up in thanksgiving. The guns of St. Angelo gave the signal of his new honours, and every bell in Rome answered with its notes of congratulation. That afternoon, as is the custom on such solemnities, the Holy Father, with some seventeen Cardinals and a number of the prelates of his Court, went to St. Peter’s to venerate the new Beato, and to receive from the hands of Father Fortis, the General of the Society of Jesus, the usual offering of a relic and Life of our Saint.

The news of the Decree of Beatification reached Palma late on the 23rd of July in the same year, and was greeted by ringing the College bells, while an inscription “Beato Alonso Rodriguez” gleamed out from the façade of the Church. Two days later, on the feast of St. James, the birthday of our Saint, a solemn “Te Deum” was sung, in the great Cathedral Church.

In the magnificent chapel which had been erected in the Church of Montesion, a precious resting-place had been begun immediately on the definite announcement of the Beatification. Upon a lofty circular base of polished jasper, in which Majorca is so rich, rises a graceful temple of six fluted Corinthian columns of white marble, supporting a dome, which serves as a canopy over the shrine of the Saint. High above the altar, which is quite detached, and stands some way off the base, and resting upon a massive black marble pedestal, is a rich sarcophagus, within which, and seen through a large plate of glass, lies the recumbent figure, containing the relics of St. Alonso. A white marble slab, let into the face of the pedestal, bears in letters of gilt bronze the name of the Saint. The figure is robed in a habit of rich black silk velvet and a silver crown is upon its head, with rays of silver around it.

The body was translated to this its present resting-place on the 21st of October in that year. On the 23rd, the monument was publicly unveiled; and for the next three days, a series of magnificent services were celebrated in the Church of Montesion. Besides the rich decorations, paintings and inscriptions of the Church, the Porteria, the scene of so large a portion of our Saint’s life, received its share of honour. Over the inner lintel of the second door, in a niche, was placed the old statue of our Saint, which had been for some two centuries and more in the room where he died,¹⁰10In the Church of de la Mercede of the Trinitarians, there was, in 1825, a statue of our Saint, carved in wood, of life size, which was ordered by a Religious of that Community when the Saint was living, and which served as a model for the wax mask in his shrine. V. Furio y Sastre, p. 299, and passim. Cf. Boll., 594, seq. and which is now in the chapel of the Saint. Segovia did not forget the Saint to which it had given birth, and on the 30th of October it celebrated the Beatification of its townsman by magnificent religious functions, both in the Cathedral and in the Church of the Episcopal Seminary, which had formerly belonged to the Society of Jesus, and where the remains of the two sisters of the Saint still lie buried. King Ferdinand VII., with the royal family, took part in the solemnities.¹¹11Letter, MS., Montesion.

Ten years after these celebrations, a Decree of the Queen Regent, Maria Christina, in July, 1835, drove the Fathers of Montesion, for a third time, from their venerated home, and from the shrine of their Saint. Some years later they returned again, only to be a fourth time expelled by the Revolution which drove the Bourbons from the throne in 1868. A number of miracles, which are recorded in the pages of the Bollandists,¹²12P. 654, § 3. and the growing devotion to our Saint which was their result, caused steps to be taken very shortly afterwards, to obtain for St. Alonso the highest honours of the Church. Accordingly, in 1831, a petition was presented to the Congregation of Rites begging for an enquiry into these miracles.

In 1838, the city of Palma was attacked with smallpox. Two daughters of Don Joachim Roca y Rayó, a gentleman of that city, were seized with the malady. Both of them recovered; but one of them, named Joachina, for a whole year afterwards was afflicted by chronic headaches of the most acute description, accompanied with convulsions and delirium. p. 243Nor did the prescriptions of her medical men prove of much value, owing, in no small part to the unwillingness of the invalid to follow their directions in the intervals between the seizures. Added to all this, in the beginning of 1839, an internal tumour began rapidly to form; her body became swollen, she was unable to retain any food, and was at last given up by the doctors.

On the morning of the 27th of July, Joachina appeared to be in her agony. For six days previous nothing of any sort had passed her lips. Her extremities were already cold, and she had almost lost her speech. A priest and one of the maid servants of the family, who were near her bedside, with difficulty divined the words which she uttered, “Blessed Alonso!” The servant at once brought her a picture of the Saint, and placed it—as best she could—in her hands. The lips of the dying girl still moved; but for a long time it was impossible to understand what she said. At last they made out the words: “Father Vice-Rector knows.” Father Sancho, the Superior of Montesion, of whom she spoke, had been by her bed-side the whole night through; and, as he left her at five o’clock to say Mass, he asked her in whose honour she would wish him to offer up the Holy Sacrifice. Joachina had answered, “In honour of B. Alonso Rodriguez.”

Just at this moment this Father had returned to the house, and was trying to console the parents of the girl for their loss, which seemed imminent. The servant went in search of him, and when he came, he made out with difficulty the following words of the dying girl; “He has told me that they must go to Montesion and bring me some of his dust, and put it into my broth, and then I shall not vomit.” He gathered that Joachina referred to some heavenly message from St. Alonso, and at once sent the lay-Brother who was with him for some dust from the coffin of the Saint. As soon as it arrived, Father Sancho put it into a teaspoonful of broth, and while he and all those around offered up an “Our Father,” a “Hail Mary,” and a “Glory be to the Father,” in honour of St. Alonso, to ask for the girl’s recovery, she began to sip the broth.

Instantly she regained her voice; her face resumed its natural colour, the rash which covered her disappeared, and she begged to be allowed to take all the contents of the plate. The doctor, who was present, hesitated to grant her request; but three or four minutes afterwards, seeing that the girl was perfectly cured, he gave her the soup-plate, and she greedily emptied its contents at one draught. No vestige of the large tumour was left. The whole case was examined into juridically three years later, and Joachina Rayó was then, and had been from the time of her cure, perfectly well.

When the Canonization of five Saints, which took place in the reign of Gregory the XVI., on the 26th of May, 1839, was approaching, an effort was made to add St. Alonso to the five; and the extraordinary character of this miracle was urged as a motive for accepting it as a double miracle. But, in spite of the favour with which the request was received by the Holy Father, the Congregation of Rites declined to agree to the proposition.

Sister Mary Alphonsa Gallis, the Portress of the Colettines of Antwerp, fell grievously ill in 1863. She was then thirty years old. After much suffering, which had kept her awake night after night, she soon became unable to take any solid food. There could be no doubt about the nature of the disease. Her father had died of cancer, and her brother was suffering from the same disease. Her tortures rapidly increased; the smallest quantity of liquid caused her most fearful suffering. For the last three months of her illness, sleep was impossible to her. She had the most acute pain in the back and stomach, with an utter nausea of any nourishment, and she lay on her bed more like a corpse than a living being.

The Community, seeing that the doctors gave no hope of cure, turned to St. Alonso for help. They begged the poor sufferer to join them in a novena to our Saint. She hesitated a little at first, but finally consented, though all that she could do was to say an “Our Father” and “Hail Mary” each day. The eighth day of the novena arrived, nor was there the slightest sign of change for the better. On the following day, Saturday, the 5th of December, Sister Mary Alphonsa had received Holy Communion, when, before she had recited the prayers of the novena, about seven or half-past seven in the morning, she felt suddenly, in her whole frame, a new life, and found herself perfectly well. She did not, however, get up, but waited for her Superior to come as usual to give her a blessing. As soon as she entered the cell, the Portress exclaimed, “I feel quite well, I shall get up at once, and go to the Chapel!” “Very good! p. 244Thank God, and be of good courage; but you must not get up,” was the quiet reply of the Mother Abbess. In vain the Sister sent the infirmarian to her Superior to ask a second time for leave to rise. It was evident that the Superior gave no credit to her statement.

At ten o’clock, however, the bell rang for the nuns to assemble in the Chapel to prepare for Confession. As Sister Alphonsa regarded this as an order binding on all those who were well, she leaped from her bed, turned up the mattress, put on her sandals and her mantle, and ran down the corridor. One can picture the amazement of all the Community, as the Sister entered the choir. There she waited her turn for Confession; and from that moment resumed in every detail the austere life of the Community. The doctor, who came three days later, was perfectly astounded to see her at the grate, looking so well and stout. Up to this very day, though far advanced in years, she is still strong and in excellent health; and is able to follow all the severity of her most severe rule. The Convent has become quite a centre of devotion to St. Alonso.¹³13Letter from Antwerp, April 6th, 1889.

The immediate result of this new miracle was to obtain from Rome remissorial letters for the opening of an Apostolic process for the juridical examination of this cure. The miracle was finally approved at Rome on February the 4th, 1871. It was not, however, until the January of 1885 that under the new Pontiff, Leo XIII., the cause was resumed. The final Congregation in presence of His Holiness took place on the 6th of September, 1887.

The Sacerdotal Jubilee of Leo XIII., which was hailed by peoples and princes with such respectful enthusiasm, was a fitting occasion to glorify the Servants of God whose canonization had been decreed. The seven founders of the Order of Servites, with the three Saints of the Society of Jesus, Peter the Missioner, John the Student, and Alonso the lay-Brother, were the ten whose honours were to add to the joys of a world-wide festivity. On January 15th, 1888, the humble Porter, with the other nine, received the highest honours the Church can award. To them, however, the misfortune of the times denied the accustomed splendours of a Canonization in St. Peter’s, and, as in the previous honours given to the Saints, the ceremony took place in the comparatively narrow and confined space of the Hall over the Vestibule of St. Peter. Otherwise, every detail of the magnificent rite was carried out in all its majestic fulness. The long and lofty hall was fresh from the hand of the architect, under whose direction it had been magnificently and permanently decorated as a Papal Chapel. The great windows of the hall were draped, and the softened light of day mingled with that of thousands of lamps and of candles. After the “Veni Creator,” and the usual petitions from the Cardinal Procurator of the Cause, Leo XIII. read from his throne the Decree of Canonization.

“To the honour of the Holy and Undivided Trinity, to the exaltation of the Catholic Faith, and the increase of the Christian Religion, by the authority of our Lord Jesus Christ, of the Blessed Apostles Peter and Paul, and by our own authority: after mature deliberation and after frequently imploring the aid of God, and with the advice of our Venerable Brethren, the Cardinals of the Holy Roman Church, of the Patriarchs, Archbishops, and Bishops living in Rome, we declare and define that the blessed Confessors Bonfiglio Monaldi, Buonagiunta Manetti, Manetto dell’ Antella, Amadio Amidei, Uguccione Uguccioni (Ricovero Lippi), Sostegno Sostegni, Alessio Falconieri, Peter Claver, John Berchmans, and Alonso Rodriguez are Saints, and we inscribe them on the roll of Saints. We determine that their festivals are to be kept with devout reverence by the whole Church—of Blessed Bonfiglio and his companions, on February 11th, of Peter (Claver) on September 9th, of John (Berchmans) on August 13th, and of Alonso (Rodriguez) on October 30th. In the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Ghost. Amen.”

A blast of silver trumpets told to the Eternal City the infallible word of Peter speaking through Leo, and the bells of St. Peter caught up the good tidings and they were repeated from every campanile of Rome, while the “Te Deum” leapt up like a mighty flame with its full song of praise. During the Mass which followed, after the Gospel, his Holiness spoke the praises of the new Saints in an eloquent homily.

At Segovia and at Majorca the echoes of the final triumph of Alonso Rodriguez were heard in the solemn festivities in both cities. Those of Majorca were especially magnificent. The Church of Montesion, the scene of so many events in his life, was decorated with great splendour, and the relics of the Saint were transferred to a new shrine, which was placed over the high altar, and a solemn Mass was sung at the expense of the municipality. One most impressive portion of these fiestas was when, in solemn procession, the relics were borne through the streets of the city, down which the holy old man had so often passed in lifetime, to the Cathedral by the sea, and so back by another route to Montesion.

On the second day the Chapter of the Cathedral celebrated a solemn service in his honour, while on the third and last the Fathers of the Society of Jesus paid their share of honour to their Brother. And, in ever-widening circles, through his native Spain, through Europe, in Protestant as in Catholic lands, through the new world, as through the old, to the farthest islands of Australasia, spread these festivals of thanksgiving for the glory of him, in whom, for all eternity, will be fulfilled the promise, “Qui se humiliat, exaltabitur.”