Saturday, June 13th, 2020

Don’t be fooled by the warm cuddly statues you see everywhere of St Anthony cosseting the Baby Jesus. In his time St Anthony was known as the ‘Malleus hereticorum’ - the Hammer of the Heretics. For good reason: he extinguished the poison of heresy - a mixture of division, ignorance and lies about Christ and his work - throughout much of Italy at the time. Even Archbishop Simon de Sully ended up bowing towards his teaching and changing his life. And yet - maybe this love displayed in the statues of St Anthony is the key to his fruitfulness. He loved Jesus so much he had been happy to not mention his earlier theological studies and serve as a simple friar in order to better spend time with Christ and serve his fellow man. This is what made him effective: he did not compromise the truth, but he did and said all with great love - something we all desire to receive. Let’s strive to live today in the same way - loving Christ with all our heart, and sharing him first of all with great love of our brothers and sisters.