Wednesday, 7 August 2013

Feast Day of St. Donatus, Patron Against Lightning, Fires, Storms




When my ancestors from Luxembourg left Europe to live in America, some settled in Jackson County, Iowa.

The village of St. Donatus bears the name of today's saint, and I have been there many times visiting the places my pioneer fathers and mothers lived.

St. Donatus, the village, is so beautiful I can hardly describe the area. There is a fantastic church, a stations of the cross which makes a pilgrim climb up a steep hill, and a lovely chapel of the Pieta at the top.

I do not know if Catholic Iowan newly weds still go to this sweet place, but they used to do so.

Being that my relatives on the paternal side of the family resemble Rabbit's relations, I can say that I am related to at least one person, if not more, in the cemetery there. 
Fr. J. Michael Flammang, the pastor of St. Donatus Church and an immigrant from Koerich, Luxembourg, built the stations in 1861. One can look here for more information on that. 

http://www.luxamculturalsociety.org/OutdoorWayofCross.htm

Some of my paternal ancestors were named Capesius, some Scheckel, some Miller, as well as other names.


Inside the church, are fantastic wood carved pieces done in the German style. Some of my ancestors stayed in Iowa, here and elsewhere, and some went westward on the Oregon Trail.

There is a magnificent photo found here of the little, stone church and the chapel.

The Mississippi River provides a great scenic drive as well. The town was named Tetes de Morts before the settlers came, and an area near by was called Mille de Tetes,  which my ancestors told me about as a child. Thousands of skulls were found, the horror of one Native tribe wiping out another, and not burying or properly dealing with the dead.  The Luxembourgian people were all Catholic, and the tribes had moved west, although some Saux Fox remained, but not in the immediate area.


But, let me write about St. Donatus himself. Now, there are at least four saints by the name of Donatus.

Saint Donatus of Muenstereifel wears the honor of being the saint of this church and village. Wiki shares this on his life:
Saint Donatus is said to be a 2nd-century Roman soldier and martyr. His parents were named Faustus and Flaminia. When Faustus was deathly ill, his wife Flaminia sought the intercession of Saint Gervasius, who assured her that her husband would recover and beget a son. This came to pass, and Flaminia named the boy Donatus, which means "gift". She educated him in the Christian faith. At the age of 17, he enlisted in the famed 12th Legion "Fulminatrix", i.e., the "Thundering Legion". He rapidly rose through the ranks and soon became a personal bodyguard to the emperor, Marcus Aurelius.
In the year 173 the 12th Legion was engaged in the Marcomannic Wars in Moravia along the Danube frontier. According to the contemporary writer Dio Cassius, part of the legion was surrounded and nearly overwhelmed when it was miraculously saved by a divine thunderstorm. Cassius attributed the thunderstorm to the invocation of Mercurius by Aurelius' Egyptian sorcerer, Arnuphis, butTertullian and other Christian writers ascribed the miracle to the prayers of the many Christians in that Legion. Later legend credited Donatus as the leader of the Christians' prayers. After the miracle, Donatus gave thanks to God, and he was martyred by the emperor.
He was buried by his mother in the Catacombs of Saint Agnes. Over the centuries, access to the catacombs was lost. In 1646, the catacombs were re-opened, and the relics of Donatus and many other saints were re-discovered. Pope Innocent X bequeathed Donatus's relics to the Jesuit church in Muenster Eifel, and they were carried in procession from Rome to the Rhineland. On June 30, 1652 the relics were at St. Martin's church in Euskirchen as a Jesuit priest, Fr. Heerde, was saying mass in the morning. With the conclusion of benediction, lightning struck the church and lit the altar and the priest on fire. He immediately invoked the aid of Saint Donatus and was miraculously restored unharmed. This miracle spread the fame of the Roman martyr throughout the region.

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