Catholic Saints & Feasts

July 11: Saint Benedict, Abbot c. 480–c. 550 Memorial; Liturgical Color: White Patron Saint of Europe and monks His Rule helped create Europe, one monastery at a time Before the time of today’s saint, to be a monk meant to wander into the Syrian desert and never come back, to climb a rocky summit in the Sinai and never descend, to sit cross-legged atop a pillar, to fast to emaciation, or to remain...

July 9: Saint Augustine Zhao Rong and Companions, Martyrs 1746–1815 Optional Memorial; Liturgical Color: Red New saints for an ancient land start the Third Millennium Today’s feast commemorates one hundred and twenty martyrs, eighty-seven native Chinese and thirty-three Western missionaries, killed in a long trail of blood from 1648 to 1930. This roll call of heroes includes lay women, catechists,...

July 6: Saint Maria Goretti, Virgin and Martyr 1890–1902 Optional Memorial; Liturgical Color: Red Patron Saint of rape victims and teenage girls A country girl suffers death for knowing right from wrong The family of today’s saint was so poor that they farmed other people’s fields. They lost their own land and became migrant laborers who ate what they grew and harvested, their rough fingers rarely...

July 5: Saint Anthony Zaccaria, Priest 1502–1539 Optional Memorial; Liturgical Color: White Patron Saint of physicians The man of the hour for his time and place In thirty-nine niches in the nave and transepts of St. Peter’s Basilica in Rome are thirty-nine statues of saints who founded religious congregations. Some of these saints are very well known, like Saints Benedict, Ignatius of Loyola, and...

July 4: Saint Elizabeth of Portugal 1271–1336 (Celebrated July 5 in the U.S.A.) Optional Memorial; Liturgical Color: White Patron Saint of widows and victims of adultery A widowed queen embraces Sister Poverty Beautifully placed in the center of a graceful arch, behind the high altar in the Franciscan convent of Saint Clare in Coimbra, Portugal, is an impressive silver and glass sarcophagus. Circu...

July 4: Independence Day—USA Optional Memorial; Liturgical Color: White “...nobis donet en patria.” Father hunger—the primordial longing to impress, to emulate, or just to find dad—moves us more fundamentally than any thirst for mom. Mom’s warm love and constant presence is typically assumed. She is always near. We spend the first nine months of life sheltered inside her sanctuary, a memory of clo...

July 3: Saint Thomas the Apostle First Century Feast; Liturgical Color: Red Patron Saint of doubters and architects ‘Perhaps’ - the crack in the unbeliever’s wall of certainty All unbelievers have a type of faith. They firmly believe in God’s non-existence and in the weakness, not wisdom, of trusting in a reality greater than oneself. Atheism is a belief system, though its object of faith is obvio...

July 1: Saint Junipero Serra, Priest 1713–1784 Memorial; Liturgical Color: White Patron Saint of California and vocations “Always forward!” was his motto and his life The United States of America’s impressive Capitol Building in Washington, D.C., includes the majestic, semicircular Statuary Hall. Each of the fifty states chooses two citizens of historic importance to represent it in the Hall. Stat...

June 30: First Martyrs of the Church of Rome 64 Optional Memorial; Liturgical Color: Red or White A madman burns Christians like human torches Wave after wave of huge British and American bombers, pregnant with ordnance, opened their bays over Dresden, Germany, on February 13 and 14, 1945. Fire joined fire until the city itself was a raging, screaming bonfire. A tornado of flames hungered for oxyg...

June 29: Saints Peter and Paul, Apostles First Century  Solemnity; Liturgical Color: Red Patron Saints of the city of Rome Like the sun, Peter and Paul rose in the East but set in the West Jesus Christ is the head of the Church. The Pope is the head of the churches. The invisible, heavenly Church, mystically depicted by the Book of Revelation and described by Saint Paul as “our mother,” is the “Je...

June 28: Saint Irenaeus, Bishop and Martyr c. 125–c. 200 Memorial; Liturgical Color: Red Patron Saint of apologists and catechists The Church was explicitly Catholic from the start The iconic opening words of Julius Caesar’s Gallic War are “All Gaul is divided into three parts.” The chieftains of these three regions of Roman Gaul (France) met yearly in the southern city of Lugdunum, known today as...

June 27: Saint Cyril of Alexandria, Bishop and Doctor 376–444 Optional Memorial; Liturgical Color: White Patron Saint of Alexandria, Egypt He was the ultimate adversary What appears from a modern perspective to be theological hairsplitting and intellectual contortionism was, in the fourth and fifth centuries, the stuff of intense, erudite, and sometimes violent debate. Today’s saint was of that he...

June 26: Saint Josemaria Escriva, Priest 1902–1975 Optional Memorial; Liturgical Color: White (Saint Josemaria is not on the Church’s universal calendar but is included here) Patron Saint of diabetics Work is our sacrifice and the earth is our altar When today’s saint was a young priest, he was a rather well-known speaker in Madrid, Spain. Besides being an excellent homilist, he also preached retr...

June 24: Birth of Saint John the Baptist First Century Solemnity; Liturgical Color: White or Gold Patron Saint of converts and epileptics A rugged forerunner cuts a path for his cousin “Dies natalis” means “birthday” or “anniversary” in Latin. But for early Christians, “dies natalis” referred to a martyr’s date of death and its subsequent commemoration in the Church’s liturgy, most typically throu...

June 22: Saint Paulinus of Nola, Bishop c. 354–431 Optional Memorial; Liturgical Color: White Patron Saint of bell makers The best of Rome—the best of the Church Saint Paulinus was to the manor born. And it was a very nice manor. He was raised on an aristocratic estate near Bordeaux, France, in an elite Roman family replete with senators and other high officials of empire. Paulinus received a supe...

June 22: Saints John Fisher, Bishop and Martyr, and Thomas More, Martyr John Fisher: 1469–1535; Thomas More: 1478–1535 Optional Memorial; Liturgical Color: Red Patron Saint of the Diocese of Rochester (Fisher) and of lawyers and politicians (More)  They would not bend to the marriage  In 1526 a German painter named Hans Holbein could not find work in Basel, Switzerland. The Reformation had come to...

June 21: Saint Aloysius Gonzaga, Religious 1568–1591 Memorial; Liturgical Color: White Patron Saint of Catholic youth and plague victims Though he had many possessions, he did not go away sad The Jesuit Order, from its very founding, had a sharp sense of its educational superiority, its fidelity to the Holy Father, and its mission to educate and spiritually guide the elites among the courts and ar...

June 19: Saint Romuald, Abbot 951–c. 1025 Optional Memorial; Liturgical Color: White Founder of the Camaldolese Benedictine Order To be alone with God is not to be alone It is easy today to slip down a technological hole into a cave piled high with televisions, video games, and the toys of virtual reality. Many technological “hermits” disappear from meaningful contact with society, and instead mar...

Immaculate Heart of Mary Saturday following the Second Sunday after Pentecost Memorial; Liturgical Color: White Wing to wing, oar to oar, heart to heart The images by which the Church describes Herself are primarily feminine—Bride, Mother, Virgin, Spouse—while masculine terms are used for the Church’s ministry— the Office of Saint Peter, Office of Bishop, Holy Orders, etc. The fatherly labor and p...

June 13: Saint Anthony of Padua 1195–1231 Memorial; Liturgical Color: White Patron Saint of lost articles He mastered the Word of God Saint Anthony of Padua is a famous Franciscan saint especially honored at an impressive shrine in Padua, in Northern Italy. But he was not born as Anthony, was an Augustinian priest before he became a Franciscan, and was from Lisbon, Portugal, not Italy. Saint Antho...

Sacred Heart of Jesus Friday following the Second Sunday after Pentecost Solemnity; Liturgical Color: White Behold the heart which drips red for love of man It’s always the tissue of male heart muscle when the molecular structure of a Eucharistic miracle is examined under a microscope. Jesus had “heart” but, more importantly, He had a heart. The word “heart” is synonymous with grit, soul, intuitio...

June 11: Saint Barnabas, Apostle Early First Century–c. 62 Memorial; Liturgical Color: Red Patron Saint of Cyprus A multi-talented disciple recruits Saint Paul Today’s saint was an Apostle in the exact same sense in which St. Paul was an Apostle. Saint Barnabas was not one of the Twelve original followers of Christ nor a replacement for one of the Twelve, like Saint Matthias. But the term “The Twe...

June 9: Saint Ephrem, Deacon and Doctor Early Fourth Century–373 Optional Memorial; Liturgical Color: White Patron Saint of spiritual directors The Harp of the Holy Spirit The Councils of Ephesus in 431 and Chalcedon in 451 ended a centuries-long scorpion dance. Bishops, theologians, and scholars from Egypt to Syria had long circled one another with suspicion, stinging their enemies with sharp wor...

The Most Holy Body and Blood of Christ (Corpus Christi) Thursday after Holy Trinity unless otherwise indicated. In the U.S, the solemnity is transferred to the Sunday after the Holy Trinity Solemnity; Liturgical Color: White The gift of all gifts Standing at the crowded table in the dim candle light of the Upper Room during the Last Supper, Jesus Christ did not hand out Bibles to the Twelve Apostl...

June 6: Saint Norbert, Bishop c. 1080–1134 Optional Memorial; Liturgical Color: White Patron Saint of Bohemia and of expectant mothers Thrown down like Saint Paul, he stood up a changed man Today’s saint was born into an elite Central European family with connections to imperial dynasties and the nobility of his time. He received an excellent sacred and secular education in keeping with his high s...