Today, were it not a Sunday, we would be celebrating the Feast of St Michael the Archangel which is traditionally known as ‘Michaelmas’. In fact in the Middle Ages his feast was considered so important it was a Holyday of Obligation.

St Michael is the captain of the angelic armies or the Prince of the Heavenly Court. The very name Mi-cha-el means, “Who is like unto God?” Satan or Lucifer was himself once the greatest of all the angels. But he was so full of pride that he began to believe he was greater than God and said, “I will not serve!” A battle took place in which St Michael was victorious over Satan and cast him out of Heaven. Satan brought many of his fellow angels with him, whom we now know as the fallen angels or the demons. You can read about it in the Apocalypse, the last book of the Bible, chapter 12.

We say the Prayer to St Michael at the end of each Mass, which has interesting origins. It is printed on the back page of this newsletter. Around 1884, Pope Leo XIII (1810-1903) had just celebrated Mass and was in conference with a few Cardinals when he suddenly fell to the ground. The doctors were called and the Pope had no pulse and appeared to be dead. Suddenly he recovered and said, “What a horrible vision I have been shown!” He saw the future where the seductive powers and devils were raging against the Church in every land. But St Michael appeared in the moment of the greatest crisis and cast Satan and his cohorts back into Hell. And it was this vision that caused Pope Leo to compose the Prayer to St Michael and order its recitation after Mass. This account was confirmed by Cardinal Nasalli Rocca di Corneliano (1872-1952) who got the story directly from Pope Leo’s private secretary, Monsignor Rinaldo Angeli (1851-1914). Pope Leo would frequently recite this prayer with a very powerful voice in St Peter’s Basilica, “beneath the vaults of the most important temple of Christianity”. Pope Leo also wrote another much longer prayer of exorcism in 1890 which he recommended priests and bishops pray often. Pope Leo himself would recite it with great piety and fervour on his walks through the Vatican Gardens.

Although it is no longer obligatory to recite the Prayer to St Michael at the end of Mass, it is a custom returning in many places. In 1984, one hundred years after Pope Leo had composed the prayer, Pope St John Paul II urged Catholics to pray it again daily, to overcome the forces of darkness and evil in the world. It is notable that Pope Francis has also encouraged us to pray the Prayer to St Michael, and in 2013 had a statue of St Michael erected in the Vatican Gardens and consecrated the Vatican City itself to St Michael. Just as the recitation of the Holy Rosary and the Hail Mary causes Satan pain as his head is crushed by Our Lady, similarly with the recitation of the St Michael Prayer, he is chained up and cast out of our lives and out of the Church. Satan is very active today in the world and in the Church, sowing error, confusion and disunity. These are his trademarks. So let us pray every day this powerful prayer, a minor exorcism, and ask St Michael’s protection on the Church, on society, on our families and on our children. Prayer cards and statues of St Michael are available from the repository.

Fr Paul Gillham, IC