Saints: Angels, Mary, Pio, Wenceslaus, Jerome, Therese, Cosmas& Damian, Zecharias &Elizabeth, V.dePaul, I.Jogues &More
The world is increasingly in chaos, but that means we should more than ever turn to God, as the saints always did.
Guardian Angels (Oct. 2): there’s a Biblically-based and ancient belief that every human, city, and country is assigned an angel by God to guard, guide, and protect. We see angels helping humans throughout the Old and New Testaments, and Jesus referred to guardian angels when He said (Matt. 18:10), “See that you despise not one of these little ones: for I say to you, that their angels in heaven always see the face of my Father who is in heaven.” Some saints, including Frances of Rome, have seen visions of their Guardian Angels.
There were multiple Marian feasts this past week. Mother Mary is honored Sept. 28 under the title Undoer of Knots, referring to her ability to intercede with God and and help us solve even the worst problems of our lives. The Protection of Mary, Mother of God (Theotokos). On Oct. 1, 911 AD, after an all-night vigil in the Blachernae church of the Theotokos in Constantinople, St. Andrew the Fool (Oct. 2) for Christ and his disciple Epiphanius saw a vision of Mary with a veil spread over her outstretched hands, “as if to protect them. She was surrounded by angels and saints.” Andrew said, “Do you see the Queen and Lady of all is praying for the whole world?” (Source: ECPubs)
Mary was also honored as Our Lady of Ransom or Mercy (Sept. 24), a vision that inspired the founding of the Mercedarian religious order to ransom Christian captives and slaves, and Our Lady of Walsingham, named for a statue of Mary and Jesus long housed in a shrine in England after Mary appeared to Lady Richeldis in England in 1061 to urge the building of a replica of the Holy House where Mary saw the Angel Gabriel.
Padre Pio (Sept. 23), born 1887 to pious Italian peasant farmers who worked hard to educate him, he became a Capuchin friar, but struggled with serious health problems his whole life (which led to his WWI discharge). A mystic, preacher, and much-sought-after confessor, he was known to levitate off the ground and perform miracles. He is the first priest in history to be recorded as receiving the stigmata, or the wounds of Christ’s Passion; the wounds bled and pained him, but smelled of roses.
Sept. 29 used to be the feast of St. Michael the Archangel alone; in the new Roman calendar, it also commemorates Raphael and Gabriel the Archangels. Michael (name meaning “Who is like God?”) is mentioned in Daniel 12:1, and in Rev. 12:7-9 as fighting and casting down Satan and his demons. Gabriel appears to the prophet Daniel in the Old Testament; to St. Zachary to prophesy the birth of St. John the Baptist; and to the Blessed Virgin at the Annunciation to announce the coming of the Messiah. Raphael is featured in the Biblical book of Tobit, assisting the young Tobias to wed Sara and exorcise the demon plaguing her, before healing the elder Tobias. St. Michael has also appeared in numerous visions over the centuries, including on Mt. Gargano to request a church and to a U.S. Marine in 1950 in Korea, about which you can read in my previous article.
St. Wenceslaus (Sept. 28), “prince of the Czechs, who was the leader of the Bohemians, trained in divine and human wisdom by his grandmother St. Ludmilla. He was severe toward himself but gentle in ruling his kingdom and merciful to the poor. He redeemed in large numbers pagan slaves about to be sold that they might be baptized. After enduring many difficulties in ruling his subjects and in spreading the faith he was betrayed by his brother Boleslaus and killed by assassins in a church in Old Boleslavia [modern Altbunzlau] in Bohemia.” (ECPubs)
St. Jerome (Sept. 30), arguably the greatest Christian linguist in history, was born to a rich family and led a wild youth before converting. He became a monk, then a hermit, where he befriended a lion and studied Scripture and its languages. He became a priest and secretary to Pope Damasus I who commissioned Jerome’s most famous work, the Latin Bible translation called the Vulgate, which was the standard Bible translation for over a thousand years. He had ground-breaking views on the education of women and penned many brilliant theological works. Jerome is a Doctor and Father of the Church. Also this past week was St. Eustochium(Sept. 28), the daughter of St. Paula, the friend of St. Jerome. Eustochium was a nun in Israel. She helped Jerome with his translation of the Bible, and he dedicated his treatise on virginity to her.
St. Therese of Lisieux (Oct. 1) or the “Little Flower” was born in 1873 to St. Louis Martin and St. Marie-Azelie Guerin Martin. Therese’s mother died when she was four, and the family moved to Lisieux. She received a vision of the Child Jesus just before turning 14, and became zealous to join a religious order. While in Italy, she even begged the pope to give her dispensation to join the Carmelites at the age of 15. After joining the Carmelites, she was known for her holiness and patience, though she developed tuberculosis which killed her in her early 20s. Therese was ordered to put down her memories and ideas, and she also wrote poetry; she is a Doctor of the Church. She famously developed “The Little Way” of attaining holiness, by doing every ordinary task well.
Sts. Cosmas and Damian (Sept. 26) were twin brothers and physicians in Asia Minor in the 3rd century. They treated patients for free and even healed miraculously. They were arrested and tortured but refused to deny their faith, and were ultimately beheaded. They were hugely popular in the Church for centuries, and their names appear in the Canon of the Mass.
Sts. Zacharias and Elizabeth (Sept. 23) were the parents of John the Baptist (see Luke 1). Elizabeth was a relative of Mary, Jesus’s Mother, and famously attested to the unborn Messias during the Visitation (Elizabeth’s words have become part of the “Hail Mary” prayer). Zacharias or Zachary was an elderly priest struck dumb after he doubted the birth of John, foretold to him by a vision of the Angel Gabriel. He regained his speech after John’s birth, and delivered a prophetic canticle.
Sept. 26 in the Byzantine Catholic calendar commemorated the death or passing of St. John the Apostle one of Jesus’s three closest friends, witness of the Crucifixion, guardian of Mother Mary, and author of a Gospel and the Apocalypse. Rachel the Matriarch(Sept. 23) was the beloved and favorite wife of the Biblical Jacob; sterile most of her marriage, she eventually gave birth to Joseph and Benjamin, and is often considered the matriarch of the nation of Israel.
St. Vincent de Paul (Sept. 27) was born a peasant in 1581 AD, became a priest, and was sold into slavery. He converted his owner to Christianity and was freed, so he returned to France. He was a parish priest and started organizations to help the sick, the poor, the unemployed, the enslaved, and others. He became a royal chaplain and founded the Lazarists, but always focused on his work with the most needy.
St. Ananias (Oct. 1) received a vision of Christ telling him to go baptize the man who would become St. Paul (see Acts 9:10-19). Tradition says he was one of Christ’s 72 disciples, a missionary who was martyred by stoning in the Roman persecutions.
St. Isaac Jogues (Sept. 26) was a French Jesuit priest who became famous after escaping the Mohawks in Canada with mutilated hands, though he returned to the missions again and was eventually martyred; he and fellow martyred missionaries of North America are commemorated on Sept. 26. One of the martyrs, St. Rene Goupil, also celebrated Sept. 29, was a French Jesuit who came to North America as a medic. He was a missionary to the Hurons in what is now Canada. He and St. Isaac Jogues were captured and tortured by the cruel Iroquois tribe; Goupil became an official Jesuit brother while they were in captivity. He was killed with a tomahawk to the head, becoming the first martyr in North America.
St. Lorenzo Ruiz of Manila (Sept. 28) is the Protomartyr (i.e. first martyr) of the Philippines. Half-Chinese and half-Filipino, he was a husband, father, and member of the Rosary Confraternity. Accused of murder for unknown reasons, he tried to escape by sea and ended up in Japan with Dominican missionaries. He was arrested, tortured, and martyred for his Christian faith in Japan.
There have been many Martyrs of China over the centuries, but they are all honored as a group on Sept. 28. You can read more about the martyred groups and individuals at Catholicsaints.info.
St. Remigius or Remi (Oct. 1, Latin Mass calendar), born 437 AD, was the bishop of Rheims in what is now France. An intelligent scholar, he was chosen as bishop when he was still below the normal age for priestly ordination. Remigius baptized Clovis, King of the Franks, and many of Clovis’s people, Christianizing the country. Remi’s brother St. Principius of Soissons (Sept. 25), also a bishop, was celebrated this week too.
St. Finbar (Sept. 25) was Irish, called “Fionnbharr” or “white head” because of his light hair. He went on pilgrimage to Rome and, according to legend, was ordained a bishop by a heavenly vision. Finbar was a miracle-worker, hermit, preacher, and monk whose monastery became famous in Ireland. Gideon the Judge (Sept. 26) is an Old Testament hero, sometimes considered the greatest of the Israelite Judges (pre-monarchy leaders). Gideon, called by God to fight the Midianites, demanded a miracle, which God graciously provided; Gideon then followed God’s instructions to choose only 300 men for his army. The men made so much noise that they totally confused the Midianites, who in the chaos killed each other!
St. Francis Borgia (Sept. 30) was related to a pope and a Spanish king, and was raised in the royal court. He was married and the father of eight children, serving as viceroy of Catalonia and Duke of Gandia. After his wife’s death, Francis joined the Jesuit order and became a priest and preacher. He held various important positions in the Jesuits, including General. He oversaw the founding of missions in the New World and insisted on Jesuits’ daily meditation, worried over what he thought a too-great focus on work over prayer. He fought heresy in the Catholic Reformation and is called the “Second Founder of the Society of Jesus [Jesuits].”
St. Callistratus and companions (Sept. 27). Callistratus was a Christian soldier in the Roman Empire who was ordered to sacrifice to idols, but refused. His courage under repeated torture inspired the conversion of 49 fellow soldiers, and they were martyred together in the year 304 AD.
St. Cleopas (Sept. 25) was a disciple of Jesus, the husband of one of the women who stood at the foot of Jesus’s cross and father of the apostle St. James the Lesser. He is most famous for being one of the first witnesses to the Resurrection after Jesus appeared to Cleopas and a companion disguised while they walked to Emmaus; they discovered Jesus’s identity only after he “broke the bread” for them, usually considered as referring to Jesus consecrating the Eucharist (see Luke 24).
St. Herman the Cripple (Sept. 25) was horribly deformed but a true genius; he is most famous for his hymns, particularly the Marian hymns Salve Regina and Alma Redemptoris Mater. St. Cyprian (Sept. 26) was originally a pagan magician who fell madly in love with St. Justina, a Christian virgin. Justina foiled his demonic arts with the sign of the cross, and converted Cyprian, who then became a priest and a bishop. They were arrested for their faith, tortured, and beheaded c. 304 AD.
Bl. Francisco de Paula Victor (Sept. 23) was born to a Brazilian slave. When he grew up and entered seminary, which seemed unthinkable to many people for a black man to do in Brazil at the time, he faced severe racism and persecution from fellow seminarians, and later from the population at large. But Francisco became a priest and his humility and holiness won over many.
Pope Linus (Sept. 23) was the second pope after St. Peter, mentioned by St. Paul in II Timothy, and traditionally considered a martyr. St. Gregory the Illuminator (Sept. 30) was married and a father but became a bishop in Armenia; a miracle-worker, he converted so many despite a long period of imprisonment that he is called the “Apostle to Armenia.” St. Rhipsime (Sept. 29) was a virgin; she and her companions were the first Christian martyrs of Armenia. St. Sergius of Radonezh (Sept. 25) was a 14th century hermit, monk, abbot, and Metropolitan of Moscow—he was one of the foremost Russian saints and mystics. Sts. Elzear and Delphina (Sept. 27) were married nobles who lived chastely; they were lay Franciscans who dedicated themselves to caring for the poor and sick. St. Jan of Dukla (Sept. 29) was a Polish Franciscan preacher and confessor who ministered in Ukraine and worked to reconcile schismatics. Bl. Bartolomé Blanco Márquez (Oct. 2) was a young catechist martyred in the Spanish Civil War.
Sts. Aizan and Sazan (Oct. 1) were chieftains in Abyssinia, who helped to spread Christianity and were allies of those persecuted by heretics. St. Romanos the Melodist (Oct. 1) was a Syrian convert from Judaism and a deacon; he wrote some thousand hymns, though only 60-80 survive. Bl. Cecilia Eusepi (Oct. 1), a lay Servite, died at the age of 19, but not before impressing others with her humility and sanctity. Adamnan of Iona (Sept. 23) was an Irish monk and abbot who mediated political disputes, helped free prisoners, and spread Roman liturgical practices. The Child Martyrs of Tlaxcala (Sept. 23) were three children martyred by their tribal chief father in the 1520s, considered the New World’s first martyrs.
Bl. Charles of Blois(Sept. 29) was a 14th century French noble, husband, and father who, despite his political warfare, was also known for his holiness. Gerard Sagredo (Sept. 24) was a Benedictine monk and abbot in Italy who tutored the son of King St. Stephen in Hungary; first bishop of Csanad, Hungary, he was martyred by pagans. Anton Martin Slomsek (Sept. 24) was a Slovenian bishop in Austria, a great educator and preserver of Slovenian language and culture. St. Leodegarius of Autun (Oct. 2) was a French Benedictine bishop and royal advisor, blinded and martyred by the mayor of the palace. Bl. Juan Elías Medina (Sept. 25) was a priest martyred in 1936 during the Spanish Civil War. Bl. Antoine Chevrier (Oct. 2) was a French priest who educated and helped disadvantaged children.
You can also read about José Ramón Ferragud Girbes, William Spenser, and Robert Hardesty (Sept. 24); Émilie Tavernier Gamelin, Jozef Stanek, Xantippa, and Thecla of Iconium (Sept. 23); Ceolfrid, Firminus of Amiens, and Caian of Tregaian (Sept. 25); Amantius of Tiphernum, Nilus the Younger, Stephen of Rossano Calabro, Louis Tezza, and Colman of Elo (Sept. 26); Lorenzo of Ripafratta and Barrog the Hermit (Sept. 27); Nikita Budka and Exuperius of Toulouse (Sept. 28); John de Montmirail, Francesc de Paula Castelló Aleu, Luigi Monza, Antonio Arribas Hortigüela, Lazaro of Kyoto, Dadas of Persia and family, and Martyrs of Thrace(Sept. 29); Felicia Meda, Amato di Nusco,and Conrad of Urach (Sept. 30); Luigi Maria Monti, Juan de Palafox Mendoza, and Bavo of Ghent (Oct. 1); and Bonaventura Relli, Georges-Edme René, and Jan Beyzym (Oct. 2).
Have a blessed week!