Q. What are the days of fasting and abstinence determined by the Rule?

A. Tertiaries must fast every day except Sunday, from the first Sunday in Advent till Christmas, and from Quinquagesima till Easter; also all Wednesdays and Fridays from All Saints' to the first Sunday in Advent; and all the Fridays in the year, unless Christmas-day falls on a Friday.

Q. Does fasting equally imply abstinence? A. Assuredly; all flesh-meat is forbidden on fast-days.

Q. What are the legitimate reasons for obtaining dispensations from fasts and abstinence? A. Health, journeys, watchings, great fatigues or other difficulties of position.

Q. May these dispensations, when granted, be used without scruple?

A. Yes, if the reasons alleged be genuine. Q. Are any dispensations allowed by the Rule itself?

A. Yes; if Christmas-day falls either on a Friday or Saturday, and when any great feast occurs on a fasting-day.

Q. Are no others permissible?

A. Yes; the Rule gives dispensation to the sick, the very poor, to women with child, wetnurses, and workmen engaged in laborious works, or dependent on their masters for their food.

Q. To whom must Tertiaries apply for such dispensations?

A. To the ordinary of the place, or the Father Director.

Q. What is meant by the ordinary?

A. The Father Guardian of a convent of the First Order, or the Father Director of the congregation.

Q. Have secular priests the same powers?

A. Yes; if these priests receive authority to that effect from the Superiors of the Order. Q. What are the worldly pleasures forbidden by the Rule?

A. The Rule forbids Tertiaries to assist at licentious feasts or entertainments; it orders them likewise to abstain from balls, plays, and other places of public_resort, unless with a special dispensation; and to prevent those about them from giving money towards such amuse

ments.

Q. What are the penances imposed by the Rule?

A. They are of two sorts-those ordered by the Rule, and those left to the discretion of the Visitor or Director of the Order. The former consist in the recitation of so many Paters for certain omissions in the Rule. The latter are left to the Visitor, and must be proportioned to the gravity of the offence and the health of the penitent.

Q. What kind of penances are imposed by the Visitors?

A. The repetition of vocal prayers; certain mortifications; exclusion from the public meet

ings; and lastly, expulsion from the congregation of the Third Order.

Q. What faults are sufficiently serious to provoke the latter?

A. Cases of heresy or public scandal, and obstinate persistence in evil or wrong-doing. Q. How can Tertiaries give proof of humility?

A. By meekly accepting the penances imposed on them, and by generously performing them to the letter.

Q. Have they no other methods ?

A. Yes.

By practising mortifications in their daily life, and conforming to the spirit of the Rule in modesty and simplicity of dress and habits.

Q. Does the Rule enter into any details on this subject?

A. Yes. It prescribes that their clothes should be of common materials, and forbids everything that tends to foster self-love and vanity.

Q. Does the Rule make no exception to this?

A. No. The Rule makes no exception; but it leaves to the Father Director or Visitor the faculties to dispense the Tertiaries according to the circumstances of position, time, and place.

Q. Are Tertiaries obliged to accept any positions of dignity or trust in the congregation to which they may be elected?

A. Yes. The Rule enjoins their acceptance of such employments for the love of God with humility and simplicity, and their fulfilment with diligence and fidelity.

Q. Can a Tertiary not refuse the title of Rector out of greater humility?

A. No. In all cases simple, humble, unquestioning obedience is exacted by the Rule. Q. Are the officers in the Third Order elected for life?

A. No; for three years.

Q. Who are these dignitaries?

A. The Father Rector, his assistant, and the members of the Council.

Q. By whom are they elected?

A. By all the professed Tertiaries at the general meeting, and by secret voting.

Q. On whom devolves the right to nominate the officers of the congregation?

A. On the Council.

Q. By whom are the elections to be confirmed?

A. By the Father Visitor, or by him who presides in his place.

CALENDAR

OF THE

CANONISED AND BEATIFIED SAINTS OF THE ORDER FOR EACH MONTH.

Taken from the Franciscan Martyrology, and approved by the Holy See.

JANUARY.

14. BLESSED BERNARD OF CORLEON,

CONFESSOR, OF THE FIRST ORDER.

BLESSED BERNARD was born at Corléon, in 1607, of good Christian parents. He learnt first the shoemaker's trade, with his father; but on the death of the latter, yielding to the impetuosity of his disposition, he embraced a military life, in which he acquired a high reputation for bravery and skill in the use of arms.

In the midst of a life of dissipation, he preserved a fervent devotion to a picture of our Saviour, and also to St. Francis; and he was always the protector of the aged, and of women and children.

Having wounded one of his fellow-soldiers mortally, in a duel which he had for some time refused to fight, he took to flight. Thereupon, reflecting on his state, and perceiving the dangers, both temporal and spiritual, by which he was surrounded, and being touched by the grace of God, he was converted, and entering the novitiate of the Capuchin Friars Minor, became a model of penance and regularity. He was filled with spiritual gifts, and was frequently ravished in ecstasies. visited those that were sick and in prison, and worked a great number of miracles both before and after his death.

He