As many readers of Faith of the Fathers blogs know, I try to incorporate "Goffine's Devout Instructions" whenever possible for a Feast, Solemnity or Memorial of the Church. Some have asked who Goffine is, or rather was, and so I did a little research, and found this information primarily from the Catholic Encyclopedia.
I condensed the article down somewhat, but if you want to read it in it's entirety just click the link above.
Here is what I have:
Leonard Goffiné was German Catholic priest born December 6, 1648 in Cologne (some sources say Broich).
At the age of 19 he entered the Norbertine Abbey of Steinfield. and he began his two year novitiate in July 1667. He was then sent to the Norbertine College in Cologne for his courses of philosophy and theology. He was ordained a priest on Ember Saturday before Christmas in 1667.
He was sent to Dunwald to assist the priests who were in charge of the direction of the parishand the convent of the Norbetine canonesses. Afterwards, in the same duty, he was sent to Ellen where there was also a convent od Norbertine nuns. He was in each of these places for 4 years until he was recalled by the abbott to fill the office of novitiate master on February 26, 1680. He was later given charge of the parish of Clairholz.
Goffine remained at Clarholz five years (1680–85), and was sent to Niederehe, a priory which the Abbey of Steinfeld possessed in the Archdiocese of Trier. He remained in Niederehe only a short time, being sent in 1685 to assist the clergy of St. Lambert's at Coesfield, in the Diocese of Munster. He left Coesfeld in 1691, where he undertook the charge of the parishes, first of Wehr, then of Rheinböllen, and afterwards of Idar-Oberstein, from December, 1696, until his death on August 11, 1719.
While he was at Coesfeld he wrote his best-known work, Handpostille oder Christkatholische Unterrichtungen auf alle Sonn und Feyer-tagen des ganzen Jahrs (brief commentaries in the form of question and answer on the Proper of the mass, principally on the Epistle and gospel of the day). This book (which is primarily known in english as "Goffine's Devout Instructions") was ready in 1687, and in 1688 it received the imprimatur of the Vicar-General of Münster, and in 1690 the approbation of Rev. William Heimbach, Norbertine prior of Meer, and of Rev. John Dirking, Rector of the Jesuit college of Hildesheim. The first edition, printed in 1690, was soon exhausted, and a second edition was printed in Cologne in 1692. Translations have been made into Moravian, Bohemian, Hungarian, English, French, Italian, and Flemish.
If you'd like, you can download a free version of "Goffines Devout Instructions" by
clicking here.
