Blessed James Kern

Feastday: October 20

“If you intend to acknowledge the pastoral and priestly office of Jesus Christ and you desire reconciliation and union with God, if you wish to prepare a sacrifice for the eternal God and obtain a priestly blessing, this then is truly where you belong. For the eternal High Priest invites you to a banquet that He has prepared for you Himself.”

(From a sermon of Bl. James Kern)

“Jakob (James) Kern came from a humble Viennese family of workers. The First World War tore him abruptly from his studies at the minor seminary in Hollabrunn. A serious war injury made his brief earthly life in the major seminary and the Premonstratensian (Norbertine) monastery of Geras – as he said himself – a ‘Holy Week.’ For love of Christ he did not cling to life but consciously offered it to others. At first he wanted to become a diocesan priest. But one event made him change direction. When a Premonstratensian left the monastery to follow the Czech National Church formed after the separation from Rome which had just occurred, Jakob Kern discovered his vocation in this sad event. He wanted to atone for this religious. Jakob Kern joined the monastery of Geras in his place, and the Lord accepted his offering as a ‘substitute.’

Blessed Jakob Kern stands before us as a witness of fidelity to the priesthood. At the beginning, it was a childhood desire that he expressed in imitating the priest at the altar. Later this desire matured. The purification of pain revealed the profound meaning of his priestly vocation: to unite his own life with the sacrifice of Christ on the Cross and to offer it vicariously for the salvation of others.

May Blessed Jakob Kern, who was a vivacious and enthusiastic student, encourage many young men generously to accept Christ’s call to the priesthood. The words he spoke then are addressed to us: ‘Today more than ever there is a need for authentic and holy priests. All the prayers, all the sacrifices, all the efforts and all the suffering united with a right intention become the divine seed which sooner or later will bear its fruit.’”

– from the Homily of Pope St. John Paul II, Beatification Mass, 21 June 1998 

Bl. James’s self-offering of love and suffering in union with Christ was a truly Eucharistic life, marked by an overflowing joy and gratitude to God even in the midst of poor health and spiritual trials. Shortly before his early death at the age of 27, he discovered the Litany of Abundant Thanksgiving, which perfectly summed up the sentiments of his generous and grateful heart. Bl. James was so inspired that he immediately had 10,000 copies of this litany printed to distribute, although he died before he could begin to propagate this devotion. In 1924, on what would have been the day of his solemn profession, he died during the ringing of the Angelus bells.

(Saint drawings courtesy of Saint Norbert Abbey, De Pere, Wisconsin.)