Święci oraz ich nauczanie w „homiliach” Godziny Czytań Liturgii Godzin

Abstract

The heroes of the faith and the evangelical lifestyle have always been looked upon with admiration in the history of the Church. It is preachers who immensely contributed to the popularization of saints. As regards the homilies and sermons about the Saints in Western Church, the study is limited to the sources found in the present Liturgy of Hours and is the second of the Lessons of the Hours, i.e. the hagiographie reading. An analysis of all whose texts about particular saints allows us to notice how abundant are their subject matters, which should be discussed in the sermons preached on the feasts of saint patrons. First we find here an explanation of the cult of saints and its relationship to the worship to God. Furthermore, the homilies under study deal with the events derived from the lives of the saints, they advocate a concrete state or lifestyle, show duties related with their appropriate state. They contain prayers and various instructions we obtain from the Saints about the Triune God and about particular Divine Persons, about the Blessed Virgin Mary, about the Angels, about man, his life, his elevation, tasks, duties, about what is beneficial and what is „human,” about the Church, Peter and the Apostles, about the Holy Sacraments, about virtues, the evangelical counsels and the beatitudes, about prayer.