Viewing all items in Resource Category: Holy Days

Scholastica (d.c. 543) should be the patron saint of any woman who can bend her brother to do her will – no matter how ‘powerful’ that brother might seem to other people. For Scholastica’s brother was no less than the great monk Benedict, who founded the famous Benedictine order and lived at Monte Cassino.   In...

Caedmon (d 680) should be the patron saint of all farmers who enjoy humming to themselves as they do the lambing this Spring.  For Caedmon of Whitby was a bit like David in the Bible – he grew up as a simple herdsman out on the hills who enjoyed composing songs and poetry for himself...

There are two confusing things about this day of romance and anonymous love-cards strewn with lace, cupids and ribbon: firstly, there seems to have been two different Valentines in the 4th century – one a priest martyred on the Flaminian Way, under the emperor Claudius, the other a bishop of Terni martyred at Rome.  And...

The Roman Emperor Claudius II needed soldiers.  He suspected that marriage made men want to stay at home with their wives, instead of fighting wars, so he outlawed marriage. A kind-hearted young priest named Valentine felt sorry for all the couples who wanted to marry, but couldn’t.  So secretly he married as many couples as...

Saint Valentine’s Day, many believe, was named after one or more Christian martyrs and was established by Pope Gelasius 1 in 496 AD.  Valentine of Rome was martyred about 269, and this day usually ‘belongs’ to him. The first recorded association of Valentine Day with romantic love (1382) is from Geoffrey Chaucer. He wrote, ‘For...

Thomas Bray was once called a “Great Small Man”, with good reason.  This diminutive 18th century English clergyman (1658 – 1730) not only helped to establish the Church of England in Maryland, but he was also founder of the Society for the Propagation of Christian Knowledge (SPCK) in 1698 and the Society for the Propagation...

The Most Reverend Janani Luwum (d 1977) was the sitting Archbishop of Uganda, Rwanda and Burundi and Boga Zaire when 35 years ago this month he was murdered by the dictator Idi Amin.   At the time the Church in Uganda was on the verge of centennial celebrations of its birth through the seed of the...

Did you have a miserable childhood?  Were your parents more absorbed in themselves than in you?   Later, looking for love, did you fall for the wrong man?  Perhaps you now have children of your own, and struggle to raise them.   If you feel your life has been ‘wrong-footed’ from the start, and that there is...

Polycarp (c. 69 – c. 155) was one of the most important Christians in Roman Asia in the mid-2nd century, because of his link between the time of the Apostles and the earliest Christian Fathers.  This disciple of John the Apostle became bishop of Smyrna and defended orthodox Christian belief against the heresies of Marcion...

Have you ever been in the position where someone is desperately needed – and you fit the bill perfectly?   It is almost as if all your miscellaneous qualifications that never made much sense before now make PERFECT sense.  And you sense that you have been chosen by God for the task…. If so, then Matthias...

If you have been hurt in your search for romantic love, Gabriel Possenti (1838-62) may be a good saint for you.  Because Possenti, born to the governor of Assisi, began by having it all.   He grew up doing the mid-19th century equivalent of eBay, nightclubs, cinema and online dating, only in those days it was...

Have you done something which haunts you?  Which makes you feel restless and defensive, every time you think of it?  Why not deal with it this month, and put it behind you?   Whatever your mistake has been, consider what the Bible has to say to you: ‘I have not come to call the virtuous but...