SAINTS FOR THE WEEK.

October 2nd.

The Holy Guardian Angels.

Christ speaks of the guardian angels for children (Matt 18: 10), and in Acts 12: 15 we read that some early Christians thought they had seen St. Peter’s angel.  This Jewish belief in our ‘heavenly counterpart’ – also implied in the writings of the Greek philosopher Plato – was made specific in a famous early Christian text, the ‘Shepherd’, by Hermas in the 2nd cent.  Although some church fathers had doubts about the issue, an early celebration of the feast of St. Michael Archangel also speaks of the angels as being our guardians.  In this country, devotion to the angels was strongly developed by theologians (e.g. Herbert Bishop of Norwich +1119, Reginald of Canterbury).  Honorius, of Autun in Burgundy (+1151), wrote that each soul is entrusted to the care of a particular angel, protecting soul and body and offering prayers for the individual to God.  The actual feast of the Guardian Angels, as separate from the Archangels Michael, Gabriel and Raphael, originated in 15th/16th century Spain, Portugal and Austria; it was made universal in 1670.