In a sunny town of Andalusia, Spain, preparations for war were
underway. Don Mancio, the lord of the castle, led his men out to fight
the Moors. That winding train of Spanish warriors going forth to battle
for the Christian cause was a scene to behold: helmets reflecting the
sun, plumes tossing in the air, magnificent Arabian steeds reeling in
anticipation of battle.
Don Mancio’s home could still be seen through the trees and olive
groves. As he rode, the knight thought of the wife and child he left
behind. It was four years since he had brought his noble bride to that
home, and his son was now three years old. But the hour of pain, the
hour of trial, had sounded, and how fairly both had stood the test.
The medieval portico at the castle gate framed the scene in his
mind’s eye: Don Mancio’s wife stood in the opening, young, fair, and
full of dignity, her pale face showing signs of her profound grief. She
held her son’s hand amid the folds of her dress while the child looked
up at his mother and father with the big, wide, and steady eyes of
innocence, which see all and understand much. He knew that something
very important was happening.
Don
Mancio, clad in chain mail, hugged his wife and son one last time. Then
off to fight the infidel Moor for his Lord Jesus Christ and his beloved
Spain!
“‘Tis well:” his young wife had said, holding back her tears. “My
knight goes forth to battle for the Cross, and for no earthly prince’s
paltry strife. God bless you, Mancio; may He keep you safe. And if you
fall in His good cause, Jesus, Your will be done.”
And so Don Mancio had set out for battle, and such was the picture that remained with him
“Alas:” he thought, “it may be I shall never see them again! Good God and Lord:” he prayed, “keep them in Your care!”
The day finally dawned upon the battlefield and Don Mancio’s Spanish
blood seethed in his veins at the sight of the waving crescent. His red
cross burned upon his chest, and his sword, raised in the air, was ready
to meet the scimitar. And then the great clash came, Christian and Moor
in bloody strife.
The fighting was fierce, and by nightfall many a Christian warrior
had met the God of battles face to face. Many others, Don Mancio among
them, had been taken prisoner by the ruthless Moors. The captives
escaped death only to meet the cruel torments of prison.
As the slave ship carried them away to the deserts of Africa, Don
Mancio watched the disappearing coast of Spain and thought of that last
scene under his castle’s gate, wondering what would become of his wife
and child.
Captivity and a Divine Friend
In Africa, Don Mancio toiled day after day under the burning sun and
the merciless Moor. But he bore his lot manfully, and patiently. It was
only then that he came to know that mysterious joy that only a few men
know: the joy that patient suffering can bring forth. Few know its taste
because few bear its agonizing pain with a willing heart for Him who
died to show the way to joy through the thorny paths of woe.
For ten years Don Mancio suffered under the lash and the weight of
chains. And during all those years not a single word came from home.
The daily toil, the stripes, the lash, the scanty food, and
everything else, were far easier to bear than this total silence from
home. This slow starvation of the heart, this burning need to hear at
least a word about his loved ones... but, nothing. Were they alive, were
they in Spain, or had they moved away? Did they think him dead? Had
they learned of his fate? These burning questions racked his brain.
Alone in his captivity, he found only one kind Friend, and he learned
to love Him in suffering as he had never done in comfort. That Friend
he saw every day as he passed out of the city gate to the fields of
toil. Hanging above the city gate was a life-size crucifix of our Sweet
Lord that had been stolen by the Moors from some beautiful Spanish
church they had ruined. There it hung in scorn for the purpose of
receiving the foul spittle, the stones, and the insults of all the
heathen passers-by.
Don Mancio’s blood boiled in his veins.
“Oh,” he thought, “if only my hands were not in chains and my sword
were hanging by my side! How I would avenge my Savior’s honor!”
But, alas! There was nothing he could do.
In his heart he vowed a solemn promise:
If by God’s will he
gained his freedom, never would he rest until he had rescued that
crucifix and set it in a shrine where love and honor would wipe out the
shame of all those years of insult and scorn.
This was his dream by night, his thought by day, while those sad
features of the Crucified grew into his heart, imprinting themselves as
they had once before on the veil of Veronica.
Thus passed the dark night of his terrible imprisonment. Ten full years now. Little did he know that the dawn was near.
Nevertheless, his darkest hour was still to come, his test of fire before he could see the light.
At times, from across the sea came Spanish missionaries, men of
courage and zeal to minister to the poor captives, braving death and
danger.
Some brought gold sent by the prisoners’ families to redeem them from
the Moorish chains. But gold or no gold, the missionaries always
brought the comfort of the Faith in the form of absolution and, O joy,
the balm of the Holy Eucharist to those starving souls.
So, once in a while, when word spread through the camps that a
missionary was in their midst, Don Mancio felt glimmers of hope kindling
within him. Perhaps, perhaps his wife had found the means to rescue
him. Don Mancio watched and waited, but in vain.
To him no rescue came. Only the questions came: Was he forgotten? Was
his young wife dead? Year after year had gone by, and not a word from
her. He knew the ransom was large, he knew. But at any cost, for any
sacrifice, she would raise it. Ah! She must be dead! Or, perhaps she
didn’t even know the place of his captivity, for none of the ransomers
that had come had known Don Mancio or his family. None had come from his
region of Andalusia.
Ransom…
But at last, one day his name was mentioned! A ransomer had arrived
asking for Don Mancio. And this is the story he told: Until now his wife
had learned no tidings of his fate. At times she had thought him surely
dead on the battlefield. But on and on she had toiled and investigated
and, above all, had suffered and denied herself and her son almost the
very means of life so as to raise a ransom for him in case he was ever
found. And, lo! chance had revealed his dungeon, and now the ransom was
here.
So, just one more night in chains and tomorrow he would be on his way home to Spain!
That night Don Mancio laid his head on his hard cot and felt nothing
of its hardness. A few more hours, he thought, a few more hours and his
ransom would be laid on the scale and his way home assured! Tomorrow the
slave-master will receive his price in gold! Don Mancio’s heart beats
fast, his eyes brightened, he saw his wife, his son, heard their words
of welcome, felt their arms around him. Was it a dream? How many times
have such dreams mocked his loneliness with visions of home? But this
time it was no mocking dream, he had seen the Franciscan friar who
brought his ransom. Yes, tomorrow, tomorrow he would be free!
Suddenly, a thought crossesed his mind like a lightning bolt. The
crucifix! In his imagination he sees that sacred form hanging from the
iron cross above that infamous gate. He sees that sacred countenance
looking down on him, that face which had grown into his heart to the
point that it had been engraved there. It had been dimmed for a moment
by his new-found bliss, but it was still the Master and Ruler there. He
seemed to hear an infinitely majestic and sweet voice: “Mancio, will you
forget Me in your joy? Will you go back and leave Me?”
“O my God! what can I do? I have no money — none! When I go, my heart’s first sacred business will be Your ransom.”
“‘When I go.’ But can you go and leave Me?”
Then before him flashed a thought that quivered in his heart like the thrust of a sword.
“My ransom money! That would buy the Cross!”
But could he face that fearful life in prison again and rob his wife and child of happiness?
“Oh, my God! You cannot ask this sacrifice!”
But again that voice asked, “Will you go and leave Me?”
Don Mancio knew no sleep that night. A fearful battle raged in his
soul. Two loves met face to face, the love of home and kin and the love
of Jesus crucified. “O Lord,” he sobbed, “I am not willing, save me from
myself by Your own bitter Passion, by Your Cross, have pity on me. Let
this chalice pass.”
But that voice–that awful pleading voice-yet repeated in the depth of his soul, “Will you go and leave Me here alone?”
Within his heart a louder voice answered: “Can you remain and send in
your stead that crucifix, that heavy iron cross, to crush the heart
that awaits you, that counts the days and hours? Think of her lonely
widowhood, of the days and nights she has spent weeping. Will you revive
them all? Ah, pity her, if not yourself!”
Yet again that other voice, weaker and fainter now, but still
distinct: “He that loves father or mother more than Me is not worthy of
Me!”
“O God:” Mancio cried, “have pity! Spare me! Let this chalice pass!”
Then, in that dread hour his anguished soul beheld a lonely garden
and in that garden a God-Man sweating blood. He, too, had known the
cost, the bitter cost of bringing grief on all who loved Him. He, too,
had endured this heartache and had shrunk before the pain. Slowly,
Mancio’s grief grew tranquil in the light of that mysterious agony of
God
“My God, my God! I cannot, I will not go and leave You in Your shame.”
As dawn broke, he rose up invigorated, the battle was over. The dawn
of that day he should have been free. Today the ransom money would be
paid, but not for him. He would still be a slave, yet he was not sad. He
was strangely peaceful. Did not Our Lord say that His cross brings
forth joy? It is the joy known only to brave souls like Mancio’s:
“For whosoever will save his life shall lose it, and whosoever shall
lose his life for my sake and the gospel shall save it” Mark
8:35–sometimes ever here below.
The marketplace was crowded. The busy murmur of voices filled the
air. Moor and Christian, master and slave, thronged to witness a strange
scene. The news had spread that one of those whose ransom had arrived
from Spain just yesterday had given up his hoped-for freedom and
exchanged himself for that old crucifix that for so long had hung in
scorn above the gate.
He must surely be mad, this Christian nobleman, to send his wife a
worthless piece of iron in his place while he remains a captive till his
death! It is said that the Moor demands for that huge iron cross its
weight in silver ducats and that he will take no less. The massive cross
is all wrought in iron and life-size!
Lo! They come to weigh it now! Christians and Moors crowd round to
see; the Moors with jeers, the Christians with astonishment,
edification, and prayers. What sort of man is this who would thus
sacrifice himself to share the heavenly folly of the Cross?!
“Think well, my son,” says the Franciscan father, as strong men
slowly lower the heavy cross on the scales. “Think well, my son; the
ample store of money I have brought to ransom you will scarcely meet the
weight of that large crucifix. Your wife has spent long years in
gathering it, and it may be more long years, if ever, before she can
send a similar sum again. Have you measured the full cost?”
For one brief moment a thick mist formed up before Don Mancio’s eyes,
but quietly yet firmly he answered, “My Father, I have measured the
cost and I am ready.”
“Be it so, my son.”
On the scales the heavy cross was laid, and one by one the silver
coins fell. Men held their breath, counting the ducats as they rang
against each other in the silent air, but still the heavy cross lay
motionless. “One, two, three, twelve, twenty, the Father counted,
praying all the while that these would be enough to outweigh the cross.
But when, when has it ever been known that our dear Lord and Master
did not pay back a hundred-fold every act of love? Just thirty silver
pieces had fallen on the scale when, lo! The scale that held the
crucifix rose high in the air as the other scale went down. O miracle!
The cross had been out-weighed by just thirty silver ducats! He who long
ago had been sold for thirty pieces of silver, today wished to be
ransomed for the same sum to set His servant free.
Mancio, too, is ransomed, for there still remains an ample number of
coins to satisfy the Moor. Mancio’s Lord, his only Friend during his
years of captivity, will not go and leave him here a slave.
Both the Ransomed and the ransomer are free.
Written and Illustrated by A.F.Phillips
Guy
was born near Ravenna in northern Italy to parents who took great pride
in him. Primarily to give them pleasure, he was meticulous in his dress
and personal appearance. Still, one day during a festival, realizing
the vanity of this way of being, and taken with deep compunction, he
stripped himself of his fine garments and gave them all away to the
poor.
Leonard
Murialdo was born in 1828 into a wealthy, but religious, family in
Turin, Italy. The eighth child in a large family, he was only four years
old when he lost his father.
Rupert
was already a bishop and known for his great virtue, when he was
invited by Duke Theodo of Bavaria, himself still a pagan, to evangelize
his people. Although the Gospel had already been preached in Bavaria,
its people were, for all intents and purposes, but nominally Catholic,
as pagan practices and Arian heretical beliefs persisted in their midst,
adulterating the purity of the Christian doctrine.
Moreover
much did it disquiet him, that he foresaw the fear and dread which his
disciples should fall in, the mischief that should light on the Jews,
the destruction of the false traitor Judas, and last of all, the
unspeakable sorrow of his dear beloved mother. The storms and heaps of
so many troubles coming upon him all at once, as doth the main sea when
it violently breaketh down the banks over the land, sore oppressed his
most holy and blessed heart.
Tutilo
was an Irish man who, while visiting the renowned Benedictine Abbey of
St. Gall in present-day Switzerland, delayed his departure – and stayed
his whole life.
King
Charles had a great admiration for the gifted monk and remarked that it
was a great pity for so much talent to be hidden away in a monastery.
But the saint himself shrank from publicity and when obliged to go to
the great cities he strove to avoid notice and compliments. All he
wanted was to use his gifts for the service of God. Though Tutilo was
the epitome of today's "Renaissance man", sanctity was his real crown.
John
came to love obedience and obeyed unquestioningly no matter how
unreasonable the task thrust upon him. At the command of his spiritual
director, he once spent an entire year watering a dry stick, thrust into
the mud, as if it were a flowering plant.
Braulio
was a brilliant scholar and a pupil of St. Isidore, who founded a
university in Seville, Spain. He eventually became a mentor to his
mentor, and went on to advise not only ecclesiasts but kings.
Lucy was born in 1672 in Tarquinia in Tuscany. Orphaned early in life, she was raised by her aristocratic aunt and uncle.
Sirmium,
then the capital of Pannonia, is in present-day Serbia. Apart from his
position as bishop, Irenaeus seems to have been a man of local
importance. Arrested during the terrible persecution of Diocletian,
Irenaeus was brought before the governor, and commanded to offer
sacrifice to the gods. At his refusal, he was stretched on the rack, but
did not relent. His mother, wife (at that time the laws of celibacy
were different) and children hung about his neck begging him to save
himself and not to abandon them.