Читать книгу The Dolorous Passion of Our Lord Jesus Christ. From the Meditations of the Saint and Prophet Anne Catherine Emmerich онлайн

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2. The Count de Stolberg is one of the most eminent converts whom the Catholic Church has made from Protestantism. He died in 1819.

3. The Bishop of Ratisbonne, one of the most celebrated defenders of the faith in Germany.

4. Mgr. Wittman was the worthy successor of Sailer, and a man of eminent sanctity, whose memory is held in veneration by all the Catholics of the south of Germany.

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Anne Catherine Emmerich was born at Flamske, a village situated about a mile and a half from Coesfeld, in the bishopric of Munster, on the 8th of September 1774, and was baptised in the church of St. James at Coesfeld. Her parents, Bernard Emmerich and Anne Hiller, were poor peasants, but distinguished for their piety and virtue.

The childhood of Anne Catherine bore a striking resemblance to that of the Venerable Anne Garzias de St. Barthelemi, of Dominica del Paradiso, and of several other holy persons born in the same rank of life as herself. Her angel-guardian used to appear to her as a child; and when she was taking care of sheep in the fields, the Good Shepherd himself, under the form of a young shepherd, would frequently come to her assistance. From childhood she was accustomed to have divine knowledge imparted to her in visions of all kinds, and was often favoured by visits from the Mother of God and Queen of Heaven, who, under the form of a sweet, lovely, and majestic lady, would bring the Divine Child to be, as it were, her companion, and would assure her that she loved and would ever protect her. Many of the saints would also appear to her, and receive from her hands the garlands of flowers which she had prepared in honour of their festivals. All these favours and visions surprised the child less than if an earthly princess and the lords and ladies of her court had come to visit her. Nor was she, later in life, more surprised at these celestial visits, for her innocence caused her to feel far more at her ease with our Divine Lord, his Blessed Mother and the Saints, than she could ever be with even the most kind and amiable of her earthly companions. The names of Father, Mother, Brother, and Spouse, appeared to her expressive of the real connections subsisting between God and man, since the Eternal Word had been pleased to be born of a woman, and so to become our Brother, and these sacred titles were not mere words in her mouth.