Saint Hyacinth and Our Lady's Statue
We shared a couple weeks ago about the beginnings of the Rosary Pilgrim, a periodical which the monastery began publishing in 1921. The Rosary Pilgrim often shared with its readers about the lives of saints, including some from our own Dominican family, and in the August - September 1926 edition, this article was published on St. Hyacinth of Poland. The article talks about an “image” - it was a large statue!
Because of this legend of St. Hyacinth, he is traditionally depicted carrying a monstrance and a statue of Our Lady! We have a small statue of him in the novitiate.
One of the customs of our monastery is inspired by this story of St. Hyacinth rescuing the statue of the Blessed Virgin from the invading Tartars - we carry a small statue of Our Lady in our pockets! At meal times, we place the statue in front of us at our places while we eat - a reminder that everything we do, even eating, is done with and for God. Some of the statues are quite worn after many years of life in a pocket!
Another little custom from the refectory is our wooden spoons. On a visit to a monastery of nuns in Rome, St. Dominic came bearing gifts for the sisters - wooden spoons which he had carried with him all the way from Spain, walking on foot. Remembering this gift which St. Dominic made to those first nuns, we each receive a wooden spoon along with the small statue of Our Lady when we enter. Some sisters like to use their wooden spoons for soup!
This is the text from the above image, for easier reading:
ST. HYACINTH was one of the earliest Dominican Saints. He belonged to a noble Polish family, the same from which St. Stanislaus Kostka was afterward descended, and he seems to have been the younger brother of St. Ceslas. He was born in A. D. 1185 and died in 1257 after a life of almost incredible labors for the salvation of souls. He was the founder of many Dominican houses in Northern Italy, Styria, Austria, Moravia and Silesia; Coming at length to Cracow he gathered around him a band of fervent novices and founded a large convent, but soon, he sent Blessed Ceslas and Henry of Moravia to establish a convent in Bohemia and set out himself to evangelize the countries of Prussia, Denmark, Scandanavia and Russia. While he was at Kiev in the last named country, as he was beginning Mass, the city was entered by the Tartars and he with his companions were forced to take to flight. He carried the Blessed Sacrament with him, but, as he was leaving the church, a voice proceeding from the image of the Blessed Virgin arrested him.
“Hyacinth, my son, wilt thou leave me behind to be trampled under foot by the Tartars? Take me with thee,” it said. Hyacinth protested. “Holy Virgin, how can I, thy image is too heavy." The answer came immediately: “Take me nevertheless, my Son will lighten the burden." And the Saint obediently clasped the image in one arm and, carrying the Blessed Sacrament in the other he went forth, crossed the Dnieper dry-shod and escaped from the Tartars. His brethren who accompanied him spread their mantles upon the waters of the river which they also traversed in safety. This miraculous image is now preserved in Lemberg. St. Hyacinth received a warning of his death on the feast of St. Dominic when he was taken ill. On the feast of the Assumption he assisted at Matins and Mass for the last time and received the Holy Viaticum kneeling on the altar steps. Then he was carried back to his cell. He died on August 15th with the words “Into thy hands I commend my spirit,” upon his lips. He was canonized by Clement VIII in 1594.
