Blog

    Stories of saints, biblical events, angels, and sacred places.

    A 17th-century engraving of Saint John of Capistrano leading troops at the Siege of Belgrade.
    Saint John of Capistrano, Priest
    A former judge turned Franciscan friar stood on the walls of a besieged fortress at seventy, crucifix raised, urging exhausted defenders into one last charge.
    An 18th-century oil painting of Saint John of Kanty, an elderly priest with a halo, miraculously mending a broken clay jug for a kneeling peasant woman as onlookers and angels watch.
    Saint John of Kanty
    The Polish professor famous for giving away his shoes and dinner, and a private rule of conduct so gentle it still guides how Catholics handle conflict.
    A 19th-century painting depicting the martyrdom of Saint Josaphat Kuntsevych.
    Saint Josaphat, Bishop and Martyr
    A mob that wanted him dead for reuniting their church with Rome got its wish — then felt, by his own bishop's account, remorse strong enough to change history.
    A 19th-century painting of Saint Joseph Calasanz teaching children.
    Saint Joseph Calasanz, Priest
    A Spanish priest opened Europe's first free public school in a Roman slum, convinced that poor children deserved an education as much as anyone else's.
    A monochrome painting of Saint Joseph, an elderly carpenter, guiding a young Jesus by the hands as the child works a hand-cranked grindstone in a village workshop.
    Saint Joseph the Worker
    Why Pope Pius XII gave Saint Joseph a second feast day on May 1, 1955, and what the Church teaches about the dignity of human labor through him.
    An 18th-century portrait of Saint Juan Diego kneeling in a landscape, clutching his tilma to his chest, with a small image of Our Lady of Guadalupe and scattered birds above him.
    Saint Juan Diego Cuauhtlatoatzin
    How a widowed Aztec convert became the visionary of Guadalupe, why his tilma still hangs above the altar, and how he became the Americas' first Indigenous saint.
    A Renaissance painting of Saint Lawrence the deacon, holding the gridiron of his martyrdom.
    Saint Lawrence, Deacon and Martyr
    Given three days to hand over the Church's treasures, a Roman deacon presented the city's poor instead, and was martyred for it on a gridiron.
    A statue of San Lorenzo (Lawrence) Ruiz inside Binondo Church in Manila, Philippines.
    Saint Lawrence Ruiz and Companions, Martyrs
    A Filipino father boarded a ship to dodge a false accusation at home, sailing unknowingly into one of history's deadliest anti-Christian persecutions.
    A 19th-century painting of King Louis IX of France in royal and devotional dress.
    Saint Louis
    A medieval king who personally heard the legal grievances of his poorest subjects under an oak tree became the only French monarch the Church ever canonized.
    A statue of Saint Martin de Porres in Lancones, Peru.
    Saint Martin de Porres, Religious
    Lima's Dominican priory almost refused to admit him over his mixed race — he ended up feeding the whole city, animals included, from its kitchen scraps.
    A Baroque painting of Saint Matthew the Evangelist writing his Gospel, guided by an angel.
    Saint Matthew, Apostle and Evangelist
    A tax collector despised by his own countrymen for working with the occupying power got up from his booth and followed a stranger who said only two words to him.
    6th-century Byzantine mosaic showing the haloed martyr Saint Pancras among fellow saints, each holding a jeweled martyr's crown
    Saint Pancras, Martyr
    Saint Pancras was executed in Rome at around fourteen years old for refusing to renounce Christ, and his name became attached to one of England's oldest churches.
    17th-century Japanese painting showing the twenty-six martyrs of Nagasaki bound to crosses amid flames
    Saint Paul Miki and Companions — The Martyrs of Nagasaki
    The story of the twenty-six Christians crucified in Nagasaki in 1597, and how Paul Miki's final sermon from the cross became a striking martyr account.
    An 18th-century devotional engraving of Saint Paul of the Cross.
    Saint Paul of the Cross, Priest
    An Italian layman spent forty days alone in a cave until a vision convinced him to found an order built entirely around meditating on Christ's suffering.
    Baroque painting of Bishop Saint Paulinus of Nola holding his crosier, surrounded by clothed onlookers
    Saint Paulinus of Nola
    Saint Paulinus of Nola gave up a senator's fortune for a bishop's simplicity. His feast, June 22, honors a poet who chose poverty over prestige.
    A mid-20th-century photograph of Padre Pio (Saint Pio of Pietrelcina) in his Capuchin habit.
    Saint Pius of Pietrelcina, Priest
    A friar in a small Italian mountain town bore the wounds of the crucifixion on his body for fifty years, while doctors and skeptics tried to explain it away.
    Renaissance portrait of Pope Pius V in red papal vestments and cap, hand raised in blessing, with the papal tiara and keys beside him
    Saint Pius V, Pope
    Saint Pius V was the Dominican friar-pope who reformed the Roman Missal, codified the Catechism of Trent, and rallied Christendom against invasion at Lepanto.
    A 17th-century painting of Pope Sixtus II in papal vestments.
    Saint Sixtus II, Pope, and Companions, Martyrs
    Seized mid-sermon in a Roman catacomb and beheaded on his papal chair, Sixtus II died at the opening of one of Rome's fiercest anti-Christian purges.
    A medieval panel painting of Pope Sylvester I, wearing the papal tiara, baptizing the kneeling Roman Emperor Constantine.
    Saint Sylvester I, Pope
    The pope who reigned through Christianity's turn from persecuted sect to imperial religion, and why New Year's Eve still carries his name across much of Europe.
    A 19th-century engraving portrait of Cyprian, Bishop of Carthage.
    Saints Cornelius, Pope, and Cyprian, Bishop, Martyrs
    A pope and a North African bishop who nearly split the Church over how to treat lapsed Christians became close allies, and died within a year of each other.