In the Sacred Liturgy the Catholic Church encounters
the central mysteries of the Christian faith which Our Lord Jesus Christ
entrusted to the St. Peter and the Apostles and their successors, the pope
and the bishops.
Arranged in an annual calendar, these mysteries pertain always and first of all
to the worship of the Blessed Trinity as Jesus Christ
revealed and to the salvation He has made available to us through the his
passion, death and resurrection.
Moreover the Church venerates in a exemplary way the Mother of God, the Blessed Virgin Mary, for her unique role in the plan of salvation.
Lastly the Church honors the martyrs and other saints, calling to mind the wonderful ways in which the Holy Spirit has raised up lowly sinners to do great things for God.
In addition to this universal calendar in which the
entire Church participates, the Church encourages peoples, dioceses and
religious communities to honor those saints and blessed who are dear to them and
their experience of faith. Therefore the Church entrusts legitimate
ecclesiastical authorities to produce such a supplementary calendar. This
is called a proprium or proper.
The canons regular confederated in 1959. One of the first tasks of the
confederation was to produce a proper of the order's saints with texts for the
breviary and missal. In so doing the confederation hoped to promote the
particular spirituality of the canons through the annual commemoration of the
sanctity of the order's spiritual predecessors and its members down the
centuries.
The
current German edition from which the list below is drawn came as a result of
the collaboration of the Austrian Congregation and the Little Brothers of the
Common Life. Confirmed by the Congregation of Divine Worship and Sacraments in
1993, it was published as Proprium der Augusiner-Chorherren in 1996 and
is now in use.
Each Stift still possesses its own celebrations particular to its history. For
example, Stift Klosterneuburg celebrates the feast of St. Leopold on November
15th with great
solemnity for he is not only regarded as a founding father of Austria, but also
is the founder of the abbey in 1114. Another important feast is the Nativity of
Mary. It is to Our Lady under this title that the abbey church and minor
basilica (on the left) is
dedicated.