Saints’ of the Week

S. Alphonsus Liguori – 1st August

Born at Naples on 27th September 1696 he went to law school at the age of sixteen, but eleven years later, having lost an important case, he decided to give up his career due to the corruption in the courts. In 1723 he began his studies for the priesthood and was ordained on 21st December 1726 at the age of thirty. He went on to found the Congregation of the Most Holy Redeemer and became a fervent preacher and moral theologian of eminence. He was much in demand as a confessor, seeking to win back the sinful by gentle and direct appeal to the Gospel. He also wrote many works of devotion. In 1775 he retired from his office and went to live in the Redemptorist community in Pagani, Italy where he died on 1 August 1787. He was canonized in 1831 by Pope Gregory XVI, proclaimed a Doctor of the Church in 1871 by Pope Pius IX, and Patron of Confessors and Moralists in 1950.

S. Eusebius of Vercelli – 2nd August

He was born about 300 and became Bishop of Vercelli in 345. Here he worked to maintain the true doctrine of the Divinity of Christ, but he was exiled by the Emperor Constantine in 355 and went to visit Christian communities in the Holy Land, Cappadocia and Egypt. In 361 he returned to Vercelli and established monasticism in the diocese.

S. Peter Julian Eymard – 2nd August

Eymard was born in 1811 in France and was ordained Priest in 1834. He joined the Society of Mary and worked as a spiritual advisor with seminarians and priests. In 1845 he rose to the position of Provincial of the Marist Order at Lyon and in 1856 founded the Congregation of the Blessed Sacrament. Two years later he also co-founded the lay Servants of the Blessed Sacrament, which was an order especially for women. The Congregation of the Blessed Sacrament began working with children in Paris to prepare them to receive their First Communion. It also reached out to non-practising Catholics, inviting them to repent and begin receiving Communion again. Eymard overcame a number of difficulties to reach his goals, including poverty in his family and in his newly founded community, his father’s initial opposition to his only son’s desire to be a priest, years of serious illness and pain, and the difficulties of getting diocesan and later papal approval for his new religious community. He died in 1868 and was canonised in 1962.

S. John Vianney – 4th August

Born in France in 1786, Jean Vianney was a French parish priest who became a Catholic Saint. He had had great difficulty in becoming accepted for ordination, but was sent to the parish of Ars, which he transformed by his preaching, his personal mortification, his life of prayer and charity for all and by his fame as a confessor.  People came to him for spiritual help from all over the world.  He died in 1859 at the age of seventy-three and was canonised in 1925.      

S. Sixtus II and his companions – 7th August

S. Sixtus II was Pope from 257 – 258, succeeding Stephen I. He died as a martyr during the persecution by Emperor Valerian whilst he was saying Mass in the catacombs of Saint Callistus. Four deacons who were with him at the time were also put to death.

S. Cajetan – 7th August

He was born at Vicenza in 1480 and studied law in Padua. In 1506 he worked as a diplomat for Pope Julius II with whom he helped reconcile the Venetian Republic. This history aside, he did not advance to the priesthood until 1516. He founded a congregation of Clerks, which came to be known as the Theatines, particularly devoted to the work of preaching and liturgical rewnewal. He travelled throughout Italy and died at Naples in 1547. He was canonised in 1671.

S. Dominic – 8th August

Dominic was born at Calaruega, Spain in 1170. He was educated in the schools of Palencia and afterwards at university. He lived by the Gospel and men came to join him, following his way of preaching and poverty. Out of this grew the Order of Preachers (Dominicans). He died at the age of 51 exhausted with the labours and austerities of his eventful career. He died at noon on the 6th August 1221.