As the Church nears the end of another liturgical year — there are only two more Sundays before Advent begins — the readings at Mass take on an apocalyptic character. We begin thinking about the end; our Lord tells us to be watchful, to stand ready, and to change our ways. November, with the Masses for the dead and Remembrance events calling to mind those who died in war and conflict, can make us think a lot about what we miss — about those we miss. Such things can make us think about the end times in a more serious way than we usually might. But, of course, in the Christian life the end is just the beginning. If we are ready for one we must be ready for the other.

In all those apocalyptic readings there is a sense of the “now” and the “not yet” in terms of the end times. This is true also of heaven. We are all acutely aware of the ways in which we are not in heaven at the moment, but it is also true that heaven is right here with us, egging us on to glory.

In a letter to one of his friends, a great French abbot who died in 1937, Dom Paul Delatte, wrote:

I don’t think that there is a single [suffering] that submerged in him, does not turn into joy. He is faithful. We are his; he is ours. Our eternity has begun. On the surface it appears that the years change, that they succeed one another; but we are already carrying our portion of eternity in the treasury of of our faith and our charity… We are travelling toward eternal love. A Dieu (to God).

Letter to Emilie Butruille, 1898

It is the sort of thing one can only write with the most profound and saintliest of hearts — totally trusting and full of faith. But he is on to something: we carry our portion of eternity in our faith and in our charity. If we want to know how to respond to the changing times, painful memories, the fear of difficulties ahead, we must give ourselves over more to acts of faith, live in faith, and look at things through the eyes of faith to understand them from the point of view of heaven. We must give ourselves over in charity to others more and more, strive to see the good in them, try to do little acts of love for others, and pray hard for those in our life. These are heaven’s actions, and the more we do those, the closer we are to bringing heaven about in our life now. Dress for the job you want, not the job you have (so the saying goes) and the same is true of our life. Live for heaven now and we will be well suited to it when our turn comes.

It is not, however, just about getting ready for the future, but being happy now. “We are his; he is ours,” Dom Delatte wrote, and on account of this fact, “I don’t think that there is a single [suffering] that submerged in him, does not turn into joy.” What we have the assurance of is the greatest and most lasting friendship of all time. He is ours. The more we submerge ourselves in him, the more our burdens become light and with that lightness comes the joy of knowing he is carrying them with us. Such a new start begins with the simplest and smallest of acts, and it can begin today.

We celebrate today the first of the sons of Saint Philip to shed his blood for Christ. St Philip had a great desire for martyrdom and that is why he is so often depicted wearing red vestments, as is done on the feast days of martyrs. Yet Saint Philip was not to be the great missionary martyr he once longed to become but was called to spend his life in Rome, faithfully administering the sacraments and preaching the word of God. It would in fact be over 300 years after the Saint’s death that an Oratorian would be martyred for love of Christ and his Church. 

The courageous bishop, Salvio Huix-Miralpeix, who led his flock faithfully up to the point of death, entered the Oratory in Vic at the age of 30 in 1907, having been ordained a priest four years earlier. In 1927 he was appointed Bishop of Ibiza where he remained for eight years until he was translated to Lerida. Just over a year later he was martyred. On 5 August 1936, at the beginning of the Spanish Civil War, he and twenty other prisoners were made to dig their own graves. Blessed Salvio asked just one favour from his murderers, that he would be the last to be executed so that as each prisoner was shot he could bless them. His life as a bishop and the details of his martyrdom are well-recorded, but what about those twenty years in his small Oratorian community in Vic?

We are blessed here in Oxford to have a large collection of writings and letters of Blessed Salvio, amongst which are his pensaments y proposits dels dies de retiro (“thoughts and intentions of retreat days”) recorded each month from December 1904 to September 1935. Each entry contains a short focus of prayer and reflection for his monthly retreat day. They give us a glimpse into the life and prayer of Blessed Salvio as an Oratorian novice, as Provost of his community and as a bishop.

Some entries from the first year of his noviciate are translated here:

10 June 1907 — First month of life at the Oratory
I will implore with special interest and fervour the help of God with the ‘Deus in Adjutorium’ and of the Most Holy Virgin Mary with the ‘Sub tuum praesidium’.

12 August 1907
I will enter the confessional with great recollection, and with intention, and with the heart raised to God.

11 November 1907
I will be more careful to hear Holy Mass with devotion.

15 June 1908
Every day in prayer: an act of humility, one of contrition, one of trust and one of resignation and conformity to God’s will.

We see here in just these few short extracts how Blessed Salvio tried to model his life on the example of Saint Philip: regularly hearing confessions, celebrating Mass with great devotion and praying at all times, with a particular love for Our Lady. His desire to accept the will of God in his life is a model of perfect humility for us all. His holy life is a shining example of a true son of Saint Philip and a holy shepherd of Christ’s flock. Blessed Salvio ended his earthly life by gaining the palm of martyrdom, joining his suffering and death with that of Our Lord. In our world where the Faith is evermore under persecution may he be an example of courage in adversity, and through his intercession may Christians persecuted for their faith be given strength. 

From November 1908 onwards, he also lists in his Pensaments a saint he has taken as his particular patron for that month. What is quite apparent is how often he chooses the saints and beati of the Oratory. Unsurprisingly Our Holy Father St Philip is listed many times, but so too are Saint Francis de Sales, Blessed Antony Grassi, Blessed Juvenal Ancina and Blessed Sebastian Valfrè. These great men who fashioned their lives after that of St Philip are there for us too, to be taken as our special patrons. Happily we now have the great privilege of adding to that list of Blessed Salvio’s patrons, Blessed Salvio himself. 

Blessed Salvio Huix, proto-martyr of the Oratory, pray for us.