Daily Martyrology for March 25

The solemnity of the Annunciation, when, in the town of Nazareth, an angel of the Lord told Mary: “Behold you will conceive and bear a son, who will be called Son of the Most High.” Mary answered: “Behold the handmaid of the Lord, be it done to me according to your word.” And thus the fullness of time had arrived. For us and for our salvation, He who was the Only-Begotten Son of God from eternity was incarnate of the Holy Spirt from the Virgin Mary and became a human being.

In the 12th century, at Schaffhausen in Switzerland, Blessed Everard, who after providing for the construction there of the Benedictine monastery of Allerheiligen, himself entered monastic life.

At York, in 1586, St. Margaret Clitherow, martyr. She was married at the age of eighteen to a wealthy citizen. Three years later, Margaret became a Catholic. She secured a Catholic tutor, whom she may have met during one of her imprisonments for non-attendance at Protestant services. She was witty, good-looking, and good-hearted. She was arrested for sending her son abroad to be educated. She refused to stand trial, because she didn’t want anyone to bear the responsibility of testifying against her. She was killed by being crushed to death.

In 1732, in Montefiascone, Blessed Lucia Filippini. At the urging of Cardinal Barbarigo she took over the direction of a pioneering school for girls that he had founded. She started a novitiate for dedicated women who pledged themselves to educate girls in schools the cardinal planned to establish throughout his diocese. When the cardinal died, she lost her patron and had to face many difficulties. She died before the turmoil was settled, but her order, the Filippini sisters, continues her work.

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Our daily martyrology was written by Fr. Hugh Feiss, OSB. Copyright © 2008 by the Monastery of the Ascension, Jerome, ID 83338.