St. Anthony & Our Lady of Fatima

St. Waudu Feast date: Apr 09 St. Waudu, also known as St. Waltrude, came from an extremely saintly family in Belgium. Her parents, her husband and her three children were declared saints. Her husband was the Count of Hennegau – and after their children were born, she convinced him to become a monk. He later founded an abbey at Haumont.She gave away all of her possessions, built a small house and lived alone. However, many people still sought her wisdom and advice. Eventually, she had so many followers that she had to have a monastery built, around which the current town…

St. Julie Billiart Feast date: Apr 08 St. Julie Billiart, co-foundress of the Congregation of the Sisters of Notre Dame de Namur, came to her religious vocation late in life, at the age of 51. She was born in 1751, the fifth of seven children. As a child, she developed a great love for Jesus in the Eucharist. At 16, she began to teach to help support her family. However, due to a murder attempt on her father, she was plunged into very poor health for 30 years, 22 of which she was completely paralyzed. During this time she was…

St. John Baptist de la Salle Feast date: Apr 07 St. John Baptist de la Salle is known for promoting and reforming Christian education, especially amongst the poor. He is also the founder of the Institute of the Brothers of Christian Schools, which now teaches around the world. The French priest was one of the first pedagogues to emphasize classroom teaching in the vernacular instead of in Latin. He also founded three teachers’ colleges and, in 1705, he established a reform school for boys at Dijon. John was born in Rheims, France to a noble family of 10 children on April 30, 1651. He…

St. Vincent Ferrer Feast date: Apr 05 Roman Catholics celebrate the missionary efforts of St. Vincent Ferrer on April 5. The Dominican preacher brought thousands of Europeans into the Catholic Church during a period of political and spiritual crisis in Western Europe. Vincent Ferrer was born in Valencia, Spain, during 1357. His parents raised him to care deeply about his religious duties, without neglecting his education or concern for the poor. One of his siblings, Boniface, later joined the Carthusian order and became its superior general. Vincent, however, would become a Dominican, and preach the Gospel throughout Europe. He joined…

St. Isidore of Seville Feast date: Apr 04 On April 4, the Catholic Church honors Saint Isidore of Seville, a bishop and scholar who helped the Church preserve its own traditions, and the heritage of western civilization, in the early middle ages. In 653, less than two decades after his death, a council of bishops in Spain acclaimed St. Isidore as “an illustrious teacher of our time and the glory of the Catholic Church.” He is regarded as being among the last of the early Church Fathers, who combined Christian faith and classical education. Isidore was born in Cartagena, Spain,…

St. Irene of Rome Feast date: Apr 03 St. Irene of Rome was the widow of the martyr Saint Castulus, a Roman military officer who was killed for spreading the Christian faith in 286. She lived in the Roman Empire during the reign of Diocletian, and died in 288. According to legend, she attended to the wounded St. Sebastian after he was shot full of arrows as depicted in the painting by artist Vicente López y Portaña.

St. Francis of Paola Feast date: Apr 02 Catholics will remember St. Francis of Paola on April 2. The saint founded a religious order at a young age and sought to revive the practices of the earliest monks during a period of corruption in the Church. Francis was born in the Southern Italian region of Calabria during 1416. His parents, who maintained a strong devotion to St. Francis of Assisi, named their son after him. The boy’s father and mother had little in the way of wealth, but they passed on a rich spiritual heritage to their son, with the…

Saint Celestine V, Pope Feast date: May 19 Celestine is a saint who will always be remembered for the unique manner in which he was elected Pope, for his spectacular incompetence in that office, and for the distinction of being the first pontiff ever to have resigned. Pietro di Murrone was born in born 1215 in the Neapolitan province of Moline to a poor family. He became a Benedictine monk at the age of seventeen and was eventually ordained priest at Rome. His love of solitude led him first into the wilderness of Monte Morone in the Abruzzi, whence his surname, and…

Feast date: May 19 St. Ives was born at Kermartin, near Tréguier, Brittany, October 17, 1253 and was the son of Helori, lord of Kermartin, and Azo du Kenquis. In 1267, Ives was sent to the University of Paris where he graduated with a degree in civil law, and he then went on to Orléans in 1277 to study canon law. Upon his return to Brittany, having received minor orders, he was appointed as the “official”, or ecclesiastical judge, of the archdeanery of Rennes (1280). In the meantime, he ardently studied Scripture, and there is strong evidence suggesting that he joined the Franciscan Tertiaries sometime later at Guingamp. He was…

St. John I, Pope Feast date: May 18 On May 18, the Catholic Church honors the first “Pope John” in its history. Saint John I was a martyr for the faith, imprisoned and starved to death by a heretical Germanic king during the sixth century. He was a friend of the renowned Christian philosopher Boethius, who died in a similar manner. Eastern Catholics and Eastern Orthodox Christians also honor Pope St. John I, on the same date as the Roman Catholic Church. The future Pope John I was born in Tuscany, and served as an archdeacon in the Church for…