September 26 across 2,026 years of Catholic history

event · HIPPO REGIUS, Numidia, September 26, 426 AD

St. Augustine names his successor, but keeps him a priest for now

At 71, St. Augustine had the people's consent put in writing and passed his daily business to the priest Eraclius so that he could study Scripture.

A painting in the manner of a fresco of a Roman basilica with round arches. At the centre of the apse an old, white-bearded man in a blue-grey cloak sits on a stone bench with one hand raised, beside another elderly seated man in orange. A younger dark-bearded man stands forward on the right with his head lowered, two scribes write on tablets at a table in front, a book lies open on a lectern, and a crowd of men and veiled women, some with raised hands, fills both sides of the nave. — St. Augustine (seated, left) names the priest Eraclius as his successor before the congregation in the Church of Peace at Hippo Regius, while the church's notaries record his words and the people's, 426 AD.
About this picture
AI-generated image, in the manner of fresco, from the paper's reference portrait based on St Augustine's Vision of St Jerome (Benozzo Gozzoli, 1464-1465, Apsidal chapel, Sant'Agostino, San Gimignano) View source artwork.

Saint Augustine of Hippo named the priest Eraclius as his successor today before a packed church, while the church's notaries wrote down his words and every shout of the crowd. He would not let Eraclius be made a bishop yet, because an early Church council had forbidden two bishops in one church and his own consecration had broken that rule. Instead he handed Eraclius the people's business and kept his remaining days for Scripture.

5 min read

Black-and-white photograph looking down on a glass-topped coffin covered in flowers, with bareheaded Capuchin friars in brown habits and uniformed police standing behind it in a crowd.

event · SAN GIOVANNI ROTONDO, Apulia, September 26, 1968 AD

A hundred thousand follow St. Pio's open coffin through San Giovanni Rotondo

More than a hundred thousand people came to San Giovanni Rotondo for the funeral of Saint Pio of Pietrelcina, the Capuchin friar who had borne the stigmata for fifty years. His open coffin was carried down the hill to the town and back in a procession of more than three hours. After a funeral Mass in the open air he was buried in the crypt of the church of Our Lady of Grace.

3 min read

More in this edition

Black-and-white portrait photograph of a smiling nun in a dark habit and veil with a white band framing her face.

feature · KRAKÓW-ŁAGIEWNIKI, Poland, September 26, 1938 AD

St. Faustina's confessor visits her at Łagiewniki, and she does not talk

Blessed Michał Sopoćko, the Vilnius priest who guided St. Faustina Kowalska from 1933 and had the first image of the Merciful Jesus painted, visited her in the convent infirmary at Kraków-Łagiewniki. She did not talk with him, saying she was in communion with the Heavenly Father.

4 min read

A sepia drawing of a clerk's hand in a dark wool sleeve writing on a wide parchment sheet covered in dense medieval script. A braided cord runs from the foot of the sheet to a round seal hanging over the table edge, and a small oil lamp burns beside a knife near a window. — About this picture
AI-generated image, in the manner of a pencil-and-wash drawing on toned paper.

legacy · ANAGNI, September 26, 1255 AD

Pope Alexander IV declares St. Clare a saint and fixes her feast

Pope Alexander IV has told the bishops of France, in a letter dated today at Anagni, that Saint Clare of Assisi is enrolled among the saints. As Cardinal Rainaldo he had been the cardinal responsible for her sisters and had promised at her sickbed to defend their life without property. The letter orders her feast kept on August 12 and lets pilgrims to her tomb off a year and forty days of penance.

4 min read

An oil painting of a candlelit stone room in which a young woman in a dark brown gown, white collar and linen coif kneels holding a prayer-book stuffed with written sheets, while a seated friar in a grey habit and knotted cord speaks to her, one loose sheet lying on the floorboards. — About this picture
AI-generated image, in the manner of French religious oil painting of the later seventeenth century, from the paper's reference portrait based on Apparition du Christ à Marguerite-Marie Alacoque (Unknown, 18th century, Musée du Hiéron, Paray-le-Monial; photograph by Benjamin Smith, CC BY-SA 4.0) View source artwork.

writings · VEROSVRES, Burgundy, 1670 AD

St. Margaret Mary writes how a Jubilee friar won over her brother

A Franciscan friar came to preach the Jubilee at Verosvres, in Burgundy, in 1670 AD. Years later, at her spiritual director's order, Saint Margaret Mary Alacoque wrote down how the friar set aside the long confession she had prepared. The friar then persuaded her brother to stop keeping her from the convent.

4 min read

Today in the Church

Saturday of the 25th week in Ordinary Time

Saints Cosmas and Damian, martyrsOptional Memorial

Saint of the day

Saints Cosmas and Damian

Saints Cosmas and Damian were martyrs honoured at Cyrrhus in Syria; according to longstanding Catholic Tradition they were physicians who treated the sick without taking payment.

On this day in the Church

1660 At Saint-Lazare in Paris, St. Vincent de Paul was carried to the chapel, heard Mass and received Holy Communion for the last time, and that evening received the last sacraments.Source
2007 Pope Benedict XVI gave his second General Audience on St. John Chrysostom, on his exiles, his death and the translation of his relics to Rome in 1204 AD.Source

Quote of the day

“Let no one therefore grudge me this leisure, for I claim it only in order to do important work.”

— St. Augustine, to the congregation in the Church of Peace at Hippo, 426 AD, St. Augustine, Letter 213, sec. 6