Saint Philip Neri
Jul 26th, 2006 by Br. Joshua
Vessel of the Holy Spirit
Towards the later years of his youth, he was more and more drawn to the quiet of deep prayer and meditation, and spent long hours in the catacombs of St. Sebastian, in a kind of novitiate. One day, in his 29th year, he experienced mystically the coming of the Holy Spirit as a burning ball of fire into his heart, and remaining deeply lodged there for the rest of Philip’s long life. So profound was this experience that many who knew him recounted the strength and vigor of his heartbeat, which was said to shake furniture and at times even entire rooms. After his death, medical examiners found that his heart was in fact physically enlarged to such a degree that his ribs in that area were cracked, a condition he endured from that day in the catacombs until his death.
