Category: Lives of the Saints

The reason that the Church honors the saints is not just to give them glory, but to hold them up as exemplars for imitation. Many of the saints became saints themselves by reading the lives of saints. Saint Ignatius of Loyola’s by reading the Life of Christ and the Lives of the Saints. If these men can make such heroic sacrifices for God, then why can’t I, he wondered. Wonder turned into determination.

Some saints wrote biographies of other saints. Saint Athanasius wrote the Life of Saint Anthony of the Desert, a work that indirectly influenced Saint Augustine. Saint Gregory of Nyssa wrote the Life of Saint Gregory Thaumaturgus. Saint Bonaventure wrote the Life of Saint Francis of Assisi. Saint Bede wrote the Life of Saint Aidan. Some saints wrote autobiographies: Saints Augustine, Thérèse of Liseux, Antonio Maria Claret, and Margaret Mary Alacoque are among them.

In a letter to her aunt, Isidore Guerin, Saint Thérèse wrote: “I love to read the lives of the saints very much. The account of their heroic deeds inflames my courage and spurs me on to imitate them.”

The Brother of the Lord

Just imagine this. The religious Jews were in expectation of the prophesied coming of the Messiah. The scepter had passed from Juda and the seventy weeks of Daniel were at an end, when “the Saint of saints” was to appear. … Continue reading

A Window Into Purgatory

There was no saint who received more revelations or had more visions of the souls in purgatory than Saint Catherine of Genoa (1447-1510).  Catherine was extremely devout in her youth, but a terrible marriage at sixteen, arranged by her father, … Continue reading

Pope Canonizes Seven on Sunday: Two Americans

Catholic Culture: Pope Benedict XVI presided at the canonization of 7 new saints—including St. Kateri Tekakwitha and St. Marianne Cope—at a Mass celebrated for a congregation of 80,000 people in St. Peter’s Square on October 21. Read more here.

Saint Bernadette of Lourdes

Yesterday, April 16, was the feast day of Saint Bernadette on the new calendar. This was the day that she died, her birthday into heaven. The old feast day for this most blessed saint was the eighteenth of February, for … Continue reading