Month of All Souls
Again, in Metten Abbey the Altar of the Death of St Benedict.
Six days before he left this world, he gave order to have his tomb opened, and forthwith falling into an ague, he began with burning heat to wax faint, and when as the sickness daily increased, on the sixth day he commanded his monks to carry him into the oratory, where he armed himself with receiving the body and blood of our Savior Christ; and having his weak body held up by the hands of his disciples, he stood with his own arms lifted to heaven. As he was praying in that manner, he gave up the ghost.
On that same day two monks, one being in his cell, and the other far distant, had one and the same vision concerning him: they saw all the way from the holy man's cell, towards the east even up to heaven, hung and adorned with tapestry and shining with an infinite number of lamps. At the top a man, reverently attired, stood and demanded if they knew who passed that way, to whom they answered saying, that they knew not. Then he spoke to them: "This is the way by which the beloved servant of God, Benedict, ascended up to heaven."
From the Dialogues of Pope St Gregory the Great
Six days before he left this world, he gave order to have his tomb opened, and forthwith falling into an ague, he began with burning heat to wax faint, and when as the sickness daily increased, on the sixth day he commanded his monks to carry him into the oratory, where he armed himself with receiving the body and blood of our Savior Christ; and having his weak body held up by the hands of his disciples, he stood with his own arms lifted to heaven. As he was praying in that manner, he gave up the ghost.
On that same day two monks, one being in his cell, and the other far distant, had one and the same vision concerning him: they saw all the way from the holy man's cell, towards the east even up to heaven, hung and adorned with tapestry and shining with an infinite number of lamps. At the top a man, reverently attired, stood and demanded if they knew who passed that way, to whom they answered saying, that they knew not. Then he spoke to them: "This is the way by which the beloved servant of God, Benedict, ascended up to heaven."
From the Dialogues of Pope St Gregory the Great
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