ST. MARK
Evangelist
 
APRIL 25
 
ST. MARK was of Jєωιѕн extraction. The style of his gospel, abounding
with Hebraisms, shows that he was by birth a Jєω and that the Hebrew
language was more natural to him than the Greek. His acts say he was
of Cyrenaica, and Bede from them adds, of the race of Aaron. Papias,
quoted by Eusebius, St. Austin, Theodoret, and Bede, say he was
converted by the apostles after Christ's resurrection. St. Irenaeus
calls him the disciple and interpreter of St. Peter, and, according
to Origen and St. Jerome, he is the same Mark whom St. Peter calls
his son. By his office of interpreter to St. Peter, some understood
that St. Mark was the author of the style of his epistles; others,
that he was employed as a translator into Greek or Latin of what the
apostle had written in his own tongue, as occasion might require it.
St. Jerome and some others take him to be the same with that John,
surnamed Mark, son to the sister of St. Barnabas; but it is generally
believed they were different persons and that the latter was with St.
Paul in the East, at the same time that the Evangelist was at Rome,
or at Alexandria. According to Papias, and St. Clement of Alexandria,
he wrote his gospel at the request of the Romans, who, as they relate,
desired to have that committed to writing which St. Peter had taught
them by word of mouth. Mark, to whom this request was made, did
accordingly set himself to recollect what he had by long conversation
learned from St. Peter; for it is affirmed by some that he had never
seen our Savior in the flesh. St. Peter rejoiced at the affection of
the faithful and, having revised the work, approved of it, and
authorized it to be read in the religious assemblies of the faithful.
Hence it might be, that, as we learn from Tertullian, some attributed
this gospel to St. Peter himself. Many judge, by comparing the two
gospels, that St. Mark abridged that of St. Matthew; for he relates
the same things and often uses the same words, but he adds several
particular circuмstances and changes the order of the narration, in
which he agrees with St. Luke and St. John. He relates two histories
not mentioned by St. Matthew: namely, that of the widow giving two
mites and that of Christ's appearing to the two disciples going to
Emmaus. St. Austin calls him the Abridger of St. Matthew. But
Ceillier, and some others, think nothing clearly proves that he made
use of St. Matthew's gospel. This evangelist is concise in his
narrations and writes with a most pleasing simplicity and elegance.
St. Chrysostom admires the humility of St. Peter (we may add also of
his disciple St. Mark) when he observes that this evangelist makes no
mention of the high commendations which Christ gave that apostle on
his making that explicit confession of his being the Son of God;
neither does he mention his walking on the water, but gives at full
length the history of St. Peter's denying his Master, with all its
circuмstances. He wrote his gospel in Italy and, in all appearance,
before the year of Christ, 49.
 
St. Peter sent his disciples from Rome to found other churches. Some
moderns say St. Mark founded that of Aquileia. It is certain at least
that he was sent by St. Peter into Egypt and was by him appointed
bishop of Alexandria (which, after Rome, was accounted the second
city of the world), as Eusebius, St. Epiphanius, St. Jerome, and
others assure us. Pope Gelasius, in his Roman council, Palladius, and
the Greeks, universally add that he finished his course at Alexandria,
by a glorious martyrdom. St. Peter left Rome and returned into the
East in the ninth year of Claudius, and forty-ninth of Christ. About
that time St. Mark went first into Egypt, according to the Greeks.
The Oriental Chronicle, published by Abraham Eckellensis, places his
arrival at Alexandria only in the seventh year of Nero, and sixtieth
of Christ. Both which accounts agree with the relation of his
martyrdom, contained in the ancient acts published by the
Bollandists, which were made use of by Bede and the Oriental
Chronicle, and seem to have been extant in Egypt in the fourth and
fifth centuries. By them we are told that St. Mark landed at Cyrene,
in Pentapolis, a part of Lybia bordering on Egypt, and, by
innumerable miracles, brought many over to the faith and demolished
several temples of the idols. He likewise carried the gospel into
other provinces of Lybia, into Thebais, and other parts of Egypt.
This country was heretofore, of all others, the most superstitious;
but the benediction of God, promised to it by the prophets, was
plentifully showered down upon it during the ministry of this
apostle. He employed twelve years in preaching in these parts, before
he, by a particular call of God, entered Alexandria, where he soon
assembled a very numerous church, of which it is thought, says
Fleury, that the Jєωιѕн converts then made up the greatest part. And
it is the opinion of St. Jerome and Eusebius, that these were the
Therapeutes described by Philo, and the first founders of the ascetic
life in Egypt.
 
The prodigious progress of the faith in Alexandria stirred up the
heathens against this Galilaean. The apostle therefore left the city,
having ordained St. Anianus bishop, in the eighth year of Nero, of
Christ the sixty-second, and returned to Pentapolis, where he
preached two years and then visited his church of Alexandria, which
he found increased in faith and grace, as well as in numbers. He
encouraged the faithful and again withdrew, the Oriental Chronicle
says to Rome. On his return to Alexandria, the heathens called him a
magician, on account of his miracles, and resolved upon his death.
God, however, concealed him long from them. At last, on the pagan
feast of the idol Serapis, some that were employed to discover the
holy man, found him offering to God the prayer of the oblation, or
the mass. Overjoyed to find him in their power, they seized him, tied
his feet with cords, and dragged him about the streets, crying out
that the ox must be led to Bucoles, a place near the sea, full of
rocks and precipices, where probably oxen were fed. This happened on
Sunday, the 24th of April, in the year of Christ 68, of Nero the
fourteenth, about three years after the death of SS. Peter and Paul.
The saint was thus dragged the whole day, staining the stones with
his blood and leaving the ground strewed with pieces of his flesh;
all the while he ceased not to praise and thank God for his
sufferings. At night he was thrown into prison, in which God
comforted him by two visions, which Bede has also mentioned in his
true martyrology. The next day the infidels dragged him, as before,
till he happily expired on the 25th of April, on which day the
Oriental and Western churches keep his festival. The Christians
gathered up the remains of his mangled body, and buried them at
Bucoles, where they afterwards usually assembled for prayer. His body
was honorably kept there in a church built on the spot, in 310; and
towards the end of the fourth age, the holy priest Philoromus made a
pilgrimage thither from Galatia to visit this saint's tomb, as
Palladius recounts. His body was still honored at Alexandria, under
the Mahometans, in the eighth age, in a marble tomb. It is said to
have been conveyed by stealth to Venice, in 815. Bernard, a French
monk, who traveled over the East in 870, writes that the body of St.
Mark was not then at Alexandria, because the Venetians had carried it
to their isles. "It is said to be deposited in the Doge's stately rich
chapel of St. Mark, in a secret place, that it may not be stolen,
under one of the great pillars. This saint is honored by that
republic with extraordinary devotion as principal patron.
 
The great litany is sung on this day to beg that God would be pleased
to avert from us the scourges which our sins deserve. The origin of
this custom is usually ascribed to St. Gregory the Great, who, by
public supplication, or litany, with a procession of the whole city
of Rome, divided into seven bands, or companies, obtained of God the
extinction of a dreadful pestilence.
 
This St. Gregory of Tours learned from a deacon, who had assisted at
this ceremony at Rome. The station was at St. Mary Major's, and this
procession and litany were made in the year 590. St. Gregory the
Great speaks of a like procession and litany which he made thirteen
years after on the 29th of August, in the year 603, in which the
station was at St. Sabinas. Whence it is inferred that St. Gregory
performed this ceremony every year, though not on the 25th of April,
on which day we find it settled, in the close of the seventh century,
long before the same was appointed for the feast of St. Mark. The
great litany was received in France, and commended in the council of
Aix-la-Chapelle in 836, and in the Capitulars of Charles the Bald.
St. Gregory the Great observed the great litany with a strict fast.
On account of the Paschal time, on the 25th of April, it is kept in
several dioceses only with abstinence, in some with a fast of the
Stations, or till None.
 
Nothing is more tender and more moving than the instructions which
several councils, fathers, and holy pastors, have given on the manner
of performing public supplications and processions. The first council
of Orleans orders masters to excuse their servants from work and
attendance, that all the faithful may be assembled together to unite
their prayers and sighs. A council at Mentz commanded that all should
assist barefoot, all covered with sackcloth -- which was for some time
observed in that church. St. Charles Borromaeo endeavored, by pathetic
instructions and pastoral letters, to revive the ancient piety of the
faithful, on the great litany and rogation days. According to the
regulations which he made, the supplications and processions began
before break of day and continued till three or four o'clock in the
afternoon. On them he fasted himself on bread and water, and preached
several times, exhorting the people to sincere penance. A neglect to
assist at the public supplications of the church is a grievous
disorder, and perhaps one of the principal causes of the little piety
and sanctity which are left and of the scandals which reign among
Christians. They cannot seek the kingdom of God as they ought who
deprive themselves of so powerful a means of drawing down his graces
upon their souls. We must join this procession with hearts penetrated
with humility and spend some time in prayer, pious reading, and the
exercises of compunction. What we are chiefly to ask of God on these
days is the remission of our sins, which are the only true evil and
the cause of all the chastisements which we suffer or have reason to
fear. We must secondly beg that God avert from us all scourges and
calamities which our crimes deserve, and that he bestow his blessing
on the fruits of the earth.