Saint
John of Matha, Confessor
The life of Saint John of Matha, born
in southern France of an illustrious family, was consecrated to God
by a vow at his birth. His life from his youth was exemplary, by his
self-sacrifice for the glory of God and the good of his neighbor. As
a child, his chief pleasure was serving the poor; and he would say to
them that he had come into the world for no other end but to care for
them. He served every Friday in a hospital, and obtained for the sick
whatever they needed. Later he studied in Paris with such distinction
that his professors advised him to become a priest, in order that his
talents might render greater service to others. For this purpose John
gladly sacrificed his high rank and other worldly advantages.
At his first Mass an Angel appeared,
clad in white, with a red and blue cross on his breast, and his hands
reposed on the heads of a Christian and a Moorish captive. To
comprehend what this vision might signify, John went to Saint Felix
of Valois, a holy hermit living near Meaux, under whose direction he
led a life of extreme penance. Another sign was given the two
hermits, by a stag they saw with a red and blue cross amid its
antlers. The two Christians then set out together for Rome, to learn
the Will of God from the lips of the Sovereign Pontiff. Pope Innocent
III consulted the Sacred College and had a Mass offered in the
Lateran basilica to understand what God was asking. At the moment of
the Elevation, the Pope saw the same Angel in the same vision as had
been given Saint John. He told the two servants of God to devote
themselves to the redemption of captives, and for this purpose they
founded the Order of the Holy Trinity, whose habit was first worn by
the Angel.
The members of the Order fasted every
day, and after preaching throughout Europe, winning associates for
their Order and gathering alms to buy back captives, went to northern
Africa to redeem the Christian slaves taken prisoner during the
Crusades or while traveling on the seas. They devoted themselves also
to the many sick, aged, and infirm captives whom they found in both
northern Africa and Spain, and who were unable to travel and thus to
return home. Saint John on one occasion was assaulted in Morocco and
left, in his blood, for dead. He was preserved by a miracle, and took
up his charitable services again.
The charity of Saint John of Matha in
devoting his life to the redemption of captives was visibly blessed
by God: the Pope approved the Constitution of the Order, and in 1198
it was canonically instituted with an establishment in Rome, where
the liberated captives were taken from Ostia to give thanks to God
and rest for a time.
On his second return from Tunis he
brought back one hundred and twenty liberated slaves. But when he was
about to undertake another voyage, the Moors attacked the ship and
disabled it before it could sail, removing the rudder and sails.
Saint John told the passengers to take the oars and set out just the
same, then he prayed on his knees to the Star of the Sea, prayers
which the sailors and passengers repeated after him. He tied his
cloak to the mast, saying, Let God arise, and let His enemies be
scattered! O Lord, Thou wilt save the humble, and wilt bring down the
eyes of the proud. Suddenly wind filled the small sail, and a few
days later brought the ship safely to Ostia, the port of Rome, three
hundred leagues from Tunis.
Worn out by his heroic labors, John
died in 1213, at the age of fifty-three.
Les Petits Bollandistes: Vies des Saints, by
Msgr. Paul Guérin (Bloud et Barral: Paris, 1882), Vol. 2; Little
Pictorial Lives of the Saints, a compilation based on Butler's
Lives of the Saints and other sources by John Gilmary Shea
(Benziger Brothers: New York, 1894).