What is a Saint?
In the Catholic Church, the saints are ordinary people like you and me who made it to heaven. They’ve done nothing that you and I cannot do, if we persevere in following Jesus Christ and living our lives according to His teaching.
Catholic devotion to the saints is nothing more than respect and admiration for the memory of the deceased heroes of the Church. We honor them as men and women of heroic virtue who can serve as our role models. They were no more perfect than are we; but, at the end of their lives – and hopefully, ours – they received from Our Lord his words, “Well done, good and faithful servant.”
We also ask the saints to intercede for us. Have you ever asked anyone to pray for you when you were having a hard time? That is how Catholics “pray to” the saints – we pray with saints, not to them. As the Letter of James says, “The fervent prayer of a righteous person is very powerful.”
Well-known saints like those below often are remembered in a special way on particular days during the year.
January – February – March – April – May – June
July – August – September – October – November – December
This Weeks Saints
January 25
Conversion of St. Paul
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Third Sunday in Ordinary Time
Catholic Schools Week
January 26
Sts Timothy and Titus
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January 27
St. Angela Merici
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January 28
St. Thomas Aquinas
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January 29
St Gildas the Wise
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January 30
Bl. Columba Marmion
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January 31
St. John Bosco
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January 25
Conversion of St. Paul
Saul of Tarsus (also known by his Greek name “Paul”) was a religious zealot, charged by the Jewish high priest with a mission to arrest followers of Jesus in Damascus, to bind them, and to bring them to Jerusalem for trial. His entire life was forged by his experience on his way to Damascus to make those arrests. He was stuck blind by a great light, from which emanated the accusation, “Saul, Saul, why do you persecute me?” He became a faithful follower of Jesus and supporter of his church. He became the great Apostle to the Gentiles, making three missionary journeys which brought him to the great centers of Asia Minor and southern Europe, and made many converts. He authored many of the books of the New Testament; in one of his letters to the early Christian community in Galatia, he summed up his life aspiration as, “God forbid that I should glory, save in the cross of our Lord Jesus Christ, by whom the world is crucified unto me, and I unto the world.”
January 28
St. Thomas Aquinas
Thomas Aquinas was the son of the Count of Aquino, born in the family castle in Lombardy near Naples, Italy in 1225. He was one of the great teachers of the medieval Catholic Church, honored with the titles Doctor of the Church and Angelic Doctor.
He was groomed by his family to become the abbot of the great Benedictine monastery at Monte Cassino, but his life took a turn when he was at the University of Naples. He became attracted to the Dominican mendicant friars and secretly joined that order, much to his family’s dismay; he was imprisoned by them for a year to “deprogram” him. When released, he completed his studies under the learned St. Albert the Great, and, later in Naples, was first attracted to the philosophy of Aristotle.
At that time, Aristotle’s philosophy was being used to counter Catholic teaching, pitting Aristotelian philosophy against Catholic theology. To the dismay of both sides, Thomas maintained that philosophy and theology were mutually compatible, and he set out to defend the faith using that same philosophy. Thomas is most famous for his combining faith and reason, culmination in his Summa Theologiae, his last and, unfortunately, uncompleted work, deals with the whole of Catholic theology.
We must love them both, those whose opinions we share and those whose opinions we reject, for both have labored in the search for truth, and both have helped us in finding it.
St. Thomas Aquinas
January 31
St. John Bosco
Giovanni Melchior Bosco was born on 16 August 1815 at Becchi, Castelnuovo d’Asti, Piedmont, Italy. Son of Venerable Margherita Bosco. John’s father died when the boy was two years old. John attended church and became very devout. When he was not in church, he helped his family grow food and raise sheep; as soon as he was old enough to do odd jobs, John did so to help support his family. He would go to circuses, fairs and carnivals, practice the tricks that he saw magicians perform, and then put on one-boy shows. After his performance, while he still had an audience of boys, he would repeat the homily he had heard earlier that day in church.
When John was nine years old, he had the first of several vivid dreams that would influence his life. In his dream, he encountered a multitude of boys who swore as they played. Among these boys, he encountered a great, majestic man and woman. The man told him that in meekness and charity, he would “conquer these your friends.” Then a lady, also majestic said, “Be strong, humble and robust. When the time comes, you will understand everything.” This dream influenced John the rest of his life.
Encouraged during his youth in Turin to become a priest, he worked as a tailor, baker, shoemaker, and carpenter while attending college and seminary. John was ordained in 1841. His service to young people started when he met a poor orphan in Turin, and instructed him in preparation for receiving Holy Communion. He then gathered young apprentices and taught them catechism.
After serving as chaplain in a hospice for working girls, Don Bosco opened the Oratory of St. Francis de Sales for boys. Several wealthy and powerful patrons contributed money, enabling him to provide two workshops for the boys, shoemaking and tailoring.
By 1856, the institution had grown to 150 boys and had added a printing press for publication of religious and catechetical pamphlets. He wrote short treatises aimed at explaining the faith to children, and then taught children how to print them. and Union of Cooperator Salesians in 1875.John’s interest in vocational education and publishing justify him as patron of young apprentices and Catholic publishers.
John’s preaching fame spread and by 1850 he had trained his own helpers because of difficulties in retaining young priests. In 1854, he and his followers informally banded together, inspired by Saint Francis de Sales.
With Pope Pius IX’s encouragement, John gathered 17 men and founded the Salesians of Don Bosco (SDB) in 1859, priests who work with and educate boys, under the protection of Our Lady, Help of Christians, and Saint Francis de Sales.. Their activity concentrated on education and mission work. Later, in 1872, he organized a group of Salesian Sisters as the Daughters of Mary, Help of Christians to assist girls.
He died on 31 January 1888 at Turin, Italy of natural causes, and was canonized by Pope Pius XI in 1934
“Without confidence and love, there can be no true education. If you want to be loved…you must love yourselves, and make your children feel that you love them.”
St. John Bosco