Dear Polly, You have always been a fun-loving damsel, full of verve and good spirits, and I am glad to see that you are putting these qualities to good use (finally).\u00a0 God gave us each a personality, and it\u2019s up to us to make sure that its weak points get shored up and its strong points yield a profit.\u00a0 In order to avoid falling into frivolity and superficiality (always a danger for those of you who are naturally the \u201clife of the party\u201d), you may find it helpful to keep spiritually close to today\u2019s saint. Pulcheria was intelligent, prudent, likeable, and (of course, being a saint) holy.\u00a0 The daughter and granddaughter of Emperors, she grew up in the elaborate and magnificent court of Constantinople (now called Istanbul), capital of the eastern empire.\u00a0 You can imagine her high level of education and culture (she later endowed the first university in that great city).\u00a0 She was the oldest of five children \u2013 three sisters and one brother.\u00a0 When she was only 15, her father died, and her younger brother was too young to take the throne.\u00a0 Everyone knew her maturity and qualities, so she was named empress and put in charge of the household and most especially of the education of her young brother, Theodosius II.\u00a0 He turned out virtuous and religious, but was an incapable ruler.\u00a0 She did everything she could to help him (she even took a vow of virginity \u2013 and convinced her sisters to do the same \u2013 to avoid having suitors try to usurp his power), but when he married a princess from Athens, she was relieved of her duties and the empire fell under the influence of his wife\u2019s supporters.\u00a0 Only after he died were the people able to get her back again.\u00a0 To stabilize the volatile situation she took a husband, an older, wise, and experienced general of humble origins \u2013 on the condition the he would allow her to keep her vow of virginity.\u00a0 In their three years reigning together, Pulcheria did enough for the peace and prosperity of the eastern empire and the healing of divisions among Christians that the Council of Chalcedon acclaimed her as \u201cGuardian of the faith, peacemaker, religious right-believer, a second St Helen.\u201d\u00a0 Her legacy lasted for centuries. I propose her to you as a kind of personal patron (besides the acoustic similarity in names) because she combined your magnetic personality with a deep sense of mission and responsibility in life.\u00a0 If she can help you do the same, we\u2019ll have another saint on our hands for sure \u2013 and we certainly could use some more saints these days. God bless, Uncle Eddy<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Dear Polly, You have always been a fun-loving damsel, full of verve and good spirits, and I am glad to see that you are putting these qualities to good use […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":359,"featured_media":145992,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"inline_featured_image":false,"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"site-sidebar-layout":"default","site-content-layout":"","ast-site-content-layout":"default","site-content-style":"default","site-sidebar-style":"default","ast-global-header-display":"","ast-banner-title-visibility":"","ast-main-header-display":"","ast-hfb-above-header-display":"","ast-hfb-below-header-display":"","ast-hfb-mobile-header-display":"","site-post-title":"","ast-breadcrumbs-content":"","ast-featured-img":"","footer-sml-layout":"","ast-disable-related-posts":"","theme-transparent-header-meta":"default","adv-header-id-meta":"","stick-header-meta":"default","header-above-stick-meta":"","header-main-stick-meta":"","header-below-stick-meta":"","astra-migrate-meta-layouts":"set","ast-page-background-enabled":"default","ast-page-background-meta":{"desktop":{"background-color":"var(--ast-global-color-4)","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""},"tablet":{"background-color":"","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""},"mobile":{"background-color":"","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""}},"ast-content-background-meta":{"desktop":{"background-color":"var(--ast-global-color-5)","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""},"tablet":{"background-color":"var(--ast-global-color-5)","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""},"mobile":{"background-color":"var(--ast-global-color-5)","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""}},"footnotes":""},"categories":[3719],"tags":[],"post_folder":[],"class_list":["post-142222","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-uncle-eddy"],"pp_statuses_selecting_workflow":false,"pp_workflow_action":"current","pp_status_selection":"","pp_force_visibility":null,"pp_subpost_visibility":null,"pp_inherited_force_visibility":null,"pp_inherited_subpost_visibility":null,"acf":[],"yoast_head":"\n