Our Patron Saints Quotes

We all have the terrible and amazing power to hurt and help, to harm and heal. We all do both throughout our lives. That’s the way it is. I suppose we just go on and do the best we can and try to do more good than bad using our time in Earth.

To so many people, the Lord is in danger of being no more than a patron saint of our systematic theology instead of the Christ Who is our life.

In Plaster I shall never get out of this! There are two of me now: This new absolutely white person and the old yellow one, And the white person is certainly the superior one. She doesn't need food, she is one of the real saints. 
At the beginning I hated her, she had no personality -- She lay in bed with me like a dead body 
And I was scared, because she was shaped just the way I was 
 Only much whiter and unbreakable and with no complaints. I couldn't sleep for a week, she was so cold. I blamed her for everything, but she didn't answer. 
I couldn't understand her stupid behavior! 
When I hit her she held still, like a true pacifist. 
Then I realized what she wanted was for me to love her: She began to warm up, and I saw her advantages. 

Without me, she wouldn't exist, so of course she was grateful. 
I gave her a soul, I bloomed out of her as a rose 
Blooms out of a vase of not very valuable porcelain, And it was I who attracted everybody's attention, 
Not her whiteness and beauty, as I had at first supposed. 
I patronized her a little, and she lapped it up -- 
You could tell almost at once she had a slave mentality. 

I didn't mind her waiting on me, and she adored it. 
In the morning she woke me early, reflecting the sun 
From her amazingly white torso, and I couldn't help but notice 
Her tidiness and her calmness and her patience: She humored my weakness like the best of nurses, 
Holding my bones in place so they would mend properly. In time our relationship grew more intense. 

She stopped fitting me so closely and seemed offish. 
I felt her criticizing me in spite of herself, 
As if my habits offended her in some way. She let in the drafts and became more and more absent-minded. 
And my skin itched and flaked away in soft pieces 
Simply because she looked after me so badly. Then I saw what the trouble was: she thought she was immortal. She wanted to leave me, she thought she was superior, 
And I'd been keeping her in the dark, and she was resentful -- Wasting her days waiting on a half-corpse! 
And secretly she began to hope I'd die. Then she could cover my mouth and eyes, cover me entirely, 
And wear my painted face the way a mummy-case Wears the face of a pharaoh, though it's made of mud and water. 

I wasn't in any position to get rid of her. She'd supported me for so long I was quite limp -- I had forgotten how to walk or sit, So I was careful not to upset her in any way 
Or brag ahead of time how I'd avenge myself. Living with her was like living with my own coffin: Yet I still depended on her, though I did it regretfully. I used to think we might make a go of it together -- 
After all, it was a kind of marriage, being so close. 
Now I see it must be one or the other of us. She may be a saint, and I may be ugly and hairy, 
But she'll soon find out that that doesn't matter a bit. I'm collecting my strength; one day I shall manage without her, 
And she'll perish with emptiness then, and begin to miss me. --written 26 Feburary 1961

People are sick sand starving to death in our country, in our streets, and nobody cares. They worry instead about grades and popularity and money and trying to go to America. I don't want to be another one of those people who just pretends like they don't know about the suffering, like they don't see it every single day, like they don't walk past it on their way to school or work.

What is the point, you know? People are sick and starving to death in our country, in our streets, and nobody cares.

None of us are just one thing, I guess. None of us. We all have the terrible and amazing power to hurt and help, to harm and heal. We all do both throughout our lives. That's the way it is.

After all, our patron saint, rock-and-roll princess Stevie Nicks, spent years hoping some guy might save her, and then she figured out that she was absolutely capable of saving herself.

Since childhood, I've been faithful to monsters. I have been saved and absolved by them, because monsters, I believe, are patron saints of our blissful imperfection, and they allow and embody the possibility of failing.

And what is England if not a farm with soil to be tilled and vines to tend?” Ned asked. “She needs a farmer to see to her needs, and nothing else will do. That’s why our patron saint shares the same name, because the blood of the martyrs is the seed of the faith.

Warmth stole into Murdoch's voice at the memory, and Farah's heart clenched at the picture of her Dougan not yet a man, and yet not a boy, regaling a room full of hardened prisoners about the graveyard capers and bog adventures of a ten-year-old girl in the Scottish Highlands. "He described ye so many times, I feel as though any of us would have recognized ye had we seen ye on the streets. He told us of yer kindness, yer innocence, yer gentle ways and boundless curiosity. Ye became something of a patron saint to us all. Our daughter. Our sister. Our... Fairy. Without even knowing it, ye gave us- him- a little bit of sunshine and hope in a world of shadow and pain.

Welcome to the Folly,” he said. “Official home of English magic since 1775.” “And your patron saint is Sir Isaac Newton?” I asked. Nightingale grinned. “He was our founder and the first man to systemize the practice of magic.” “I was taught that he invented modern science,” I said. “He did both,” said Nightingale. “That’s the nature of genius.” Nightingale

Theology must be lived.

Our family doesn’t talk much, and usually anything important is passed along in fragments so that it feels like we’re playing that telephone game, except a sadder, real-life version.

Whose truth do you want to know, Dr. Amin Jaafari? The truth of a Bedouin who thinks he’s free and clear because he’s got an Israeli passport? The truth of a serviceable Arab per excellence who’s honored wherever he goes, who gets invited to fancy parties by people who want to show how tolerant and considerate they are? The truth of someone who thinks he can change sides like changing a shirt, with no trace left behind? Is that the truth you’re looking for, or is it the one you’re running away from? What planet do you live on, sir? … Our cities are being buried by machines on caterpillar tracks, our patron saints don’t know which way to turn, and you, simply because you’re nice and warm in your golden cage, refuse to see the inferno consuming us.

In October 2015 we were lucky enough to have our wedding at Agatha Christie’s beautiful home, Greenway, on the banks of the River Dart in Devon. If there could be such a thing as a patron saint of second marriages, I can think of no better candidate than Agatha Christie.

Address yourself to the saint whose name you bear, and he will help you. Address him in the time of sorrow, in times of sickness, in difficult situations, and in moments of joy and he will listen to your prayer. He is the advocate for those who bear his name, before the face of God. At the end of our lives, when we pass to the other world, our patron saint will stand beside us. If we honor him and pray to him, he will remain close to our guardian angel, defending us from accusations of Satan. I beg you, remember the saints whose names you bear, and pray to them to protect you, to protect your family, our people, and the entire world.

Before taking the discipline for the first time, Brother Martin spent considerable time in prayer. Then he lashed himself with an iron chain armed with hooks of steel until the blood flowed copiously; to increase the pain and at the same time to staunch the flow of blood, he rubbed the wounds with salt and vinegar, in this way hoping to make reparation for his faults and failings. Then Martin would spend a long period of time in the chapter room, meditating on the sufferings of Our Divine Lord, with his eyes often fixed upon the crucifix. Filled with a longing to participate in the sorrows and pains endured by Christ, Martin made preparations for the second nightly flagellation by ripping off his garments, which were matted with blood and glued fast to his shoulders. The instrument of torture now was a leather whip, and Martin inflicted an even more severe punishment upon his back and shoulders, begging Almighty God to take pity upon sinners and especially to open wide the gates of heaven by the conversion of infidels. It was zeal for souls, for those for whom Christ had shed His own Precious Blood, that urged Blessed Martin to lash himself mercilessly with this leather whip. He was only too happy to share in the bitter Passion of Christ, on the details of which he had just lovingly meditated; and he would only too gladly endure any physical pain, any agony however terrifying, if only thereby he could win souls to Christ. Martin now permitted his weary body to snatch brief rest which we have mentioned previously. With the approach of dawn, before four o'clock, he arose and ran to the bell tower, where he greeted the dawn in honor of the Mother of God, as was his regular custom. It was at this time that the holy Negro took the third and most severe of his scourgings. Again, it was preceded by prayer and the cruel removal of the rough tunic which was stuck fast to his flesh. This third scourging was administered with the branch of a wild quince tree, and sometimes Martin would enlist the assistance of an Indian or a Negro in whom he could confide and who was indebted to Blessed Martin for some outstanding kindness. Mercilessly the lash was applied by strong and powerful hands. In the midst of his sufferings Martin would urge on his friend to greater vigor and to be utterly brutal in applying this instrument for penance. This third and last scourging was for the relief of the Poor Souls abandoned in the fires of Purgatory.

Once we were on the high Plynlimon pass, we stopped to stretch our legs, change drivers, and make a short devotion to the shrine dedicated to the once-popular but now little-known Saint Aosbczkcs, the Patron Saint of Fading Relevance.

Why is this hitting me so hard? Yeah, Jun and I wrote each other. But then we didn’t. I don’t know a single thing about his life in the last few years. He never reached out to me, and I never bothered trying to find him. I only knew that he ran away because my dad casually dropped that fact over dinner, like, a month or so after it happened. All of us—including me—were just like, “Oh, that’s so sad,” and then went on with dinner, went on with our lives.

malungkot ako. In English: “I am sad,” or, “I am down.” But translation is hard—perhaps “tired,” the larger way you use it, is the better word. Tired of my nanay caring only about what others think of our family. Tired of my tatay believing he always knows what is wrong and what is right all the time just because he is a police chief. Tired of the kids at school talking about music and TV shows and celebrities like any of it matters. What is the point, you know? People are sick and starving to death in our country, in our streets, and nobody cares. They worry instead about grades and popularity and money and trying to go to America.

Don’t stay up too late.” “I have to finish this essay.” “There are more important things in life,” Dad says from the doorway, speaking for the first time. I want to laugh aloud since this is the exact opposite of all they’ve told me my entire life—that school, my education, should be my number one priority. After all, it’s why they brought our family to the US. But I hold it in and say good night.

I am thinking your tatay has taught you nothing about our history.” I don’t say anything. “Do you know when Rizal was executed?” I shake my head. “How much America paid to ‘buy’ this country? How many the Japanese killed and raped during the occupation?” I don’t say anything. He sighs. “It is a shame. When your kuya was first starting to speak, I said to your tatay, ‘You must teach him Tagalog and Bikol,’ and do you know what your tatay said to me?” “No,” I respond, not wanting to know. “‘The boy does not need to be confused,’” he says in a feminine, mock-American accent meant to imitate my dad. “‘Christian will be going to America, so he needs only good English.’” He lets out a sarcastic laugh. “And what is the result? None of his children knows their mother tongue. And if you do not know your mother tongue, you cannot know your mother. And if you do not know your mother, you do not understand who you are.

Wait,” I call after him, “can we get there in time for the funeral?” He stops. Over his shoulder: “There won’t be one.” Confusion hits me like a wall. “Why not?” “Your Tito Maning doesn’t want to have one. The way he died . . . it wasn’t . . . it’s not our concern.” “What do you mean?” I ask. But he’s already gone, probably retreating upstairs.

malungkot ako. In English: “I am sad,” or, “I am down.” But translation is hard—perhaps “tired,” the larger way you use it, is the better word. Tired of my nanay caring only about what others think of our family. Tired of my tatay believing he always knows what is wrong and what is right all the time just because he is a police chief. Tired of the kids at school talking about music and TV shows and celebrities like any of it matters. What is the point, you know? People are sick and starving to death in our country, in our streets, and nobody cares. They worry instead about grades and popularity and money and trying to go to America. I don’t want to be another one of those people who just pretends like they don’t know about the suffering, like they don’t see it every single day, like they don’t walk past it on their way to school or work.

That seems like a lot of work,” I say. “Wouldn’t it have been easier to move into a new house?” She stops short and glares at me. “This is where we have always lived. This is our home. We try to improve it, not abandon it.” The last time my family visited, she and Tito Maning kept making passive-aggressive comments like this about Dad in front of everyone. Though Tita Chato would defend him, he never called them out on it. He’d just look down like a dog that’s been reminded of its place in the pack as the third-born. As a little kid, I didn’t know what was going on between them and nobody bothered to tell me. It was only later, from Jun’s letters, that I came to understand how they resented Dad for leaving.

A special day,” he added, mentioning the saint whose feast day this was, San Judas—not the betrayer, but Saint Jude Thaddeus, the patron saint of lost causes, last resorts, long shots, and dead ends, and perhaps because of the hope his image offers to desperate people, a popular saint in Mexican hagiology—the Saint Jude chapel in Potosí was plastered with scribbled appeals, and offerings, and flaming racks of votive candles. Saint Jude is the second-most-popular saint in Mexico. The most venerated one is Our Lady of Guadalupe,

Peter Brown, that great historian of early Christianity, has given the most cogent explanation for the arising of the cult of the saints in the late Roman world. He explains that the emphasis of early Christian preaching on judgment, on the human need for redemption from sin, brought to the minds of common people — among whom Christianity was early successful — their social and political condition. Having strictly limited powers to remedy any injustice they might suffer, or to clear themselves of any charges of wrongdoing, they turned, when they could, to their social betters in hope of aid. If a local patrician could befriend them — could be, at least for a time, their patron — then they had a chance, at least, of receiving justice or at least escaping punishment. “It is this hope of amnesty,” Brown writes, “that pushed the saint to the foreground as patronus. For patronage and friendship derived their appeal from a proven ability to render malleable seemingly inexorable processes, and to bridge with the warm breath of personal acquaintance the great distances of the late-Roman social world. In a world so sternly organized around sin and justice, patrocimium [patronage] and amicitia [friendship] provided a much-needed language of amnesty.” As this cult became more and more deeply entrenched in the Christian life, it made sense for there to be, not just feast days for individual saints, but a day on which everyone’s indebtedness to the whole company of saints — gathered around the throne of God, pleading on our behalf — could be properly acknowledged. After all, we do not know who all the saints are: no doubt men and women of great holiness escaped the notice of their peers, but are known to God. They deserve our thanks, even if we cannot thank them by name. So the logic went: and a general celebration of the saints seems to have begun as early as the fourth century, though it would only be four hundred years later that Pope Gregory III would designate the first day of November as the Feast of All Saints.

Giordano Bruno, my unofficial patron saint, wrestled with these familiar imbalances between lived personal experience and available physical evidence in this very town. Precisely what Bruno was doing in Oxford in 1583 is a matter of endless academic discussion. But it clear he was preaching and debating his own hermetic infinitism. Having stepped beyond Ficino’s Catholic veneer and returned to a fully pagan hermetic system, he believed his use of Egyptian symbols, talimans and visualisation had uncovered humanity’s ‘source religion’ and our clearest insight into the nature of reality. What he found in the Hermetica was a fervent belief in mankind’s stellar origins and immortal destiny among innumerable worlds. The

Above the abbot's desk, two little prints. Icons, I suppose he would call them. A male figure and a female one. The male one is standing on a green hill and has a white dove perched on his shoulder. He sees me looking. 'You'll recognize our patron, of course?' It takes me a second, but I realise he's talking about St. David, a Welsh bishop of the sixth century and the patron saint of Wales. 'David,' I say. 'A local boy.' 'Local enough. He was preaching at the Synod of Brefi to a large crowd. Because those at the back couldn't hear him, a small hill rose up beneath him. The dove here settled on his shoulder.' 'That's his big miracle?' I ask. 'Making a hill. In Wales?

I know I’m not the patron saint of etiquette and me attitude stinks of arse, but at least I don’t dictate to nay cunt how they ought to spend their days. There are six billion of us on this rock. Why should we all like vanilla ice cream, wear supermarket denim and set our alarm clocks for the nine to five grind?

You can tell Rook his statue's become something like the patron saint for Our Lady, and you can see whores there night and day, praying for safe childbirth and protection from diseases and the like. Though why they think he's the man to go to for that kind of help is beyond me. Just thought he might like to know there're whores on their knees in front of them- so I guess that goes back to what I was saying about things never changing.

We’ve got to up our game. Liv’s about to tackle a letter item and her football player. She’s officially become my patron saint.

Reese," I say, still in a daze. I am totally dead-fishing our handshake, but he doesn't seem to notice. "Like Reese's Cups, the best candy in the history of the world?" He gives me a lopsided grin and I blink back at him. "Uh...no. Like Reese Witherspoon, patron saint of Southern ladies who watch too many romantic comedies.

Mara, I leave you not with my words but with the words of Emily Dickinson, my most beloved poet. I can think of no better way to call you to rise to the legacy which I bequeath to you. We never know how high we are Till we are called to rise; And then, if we are true to plan, Our statures touch the skies. The heroism we recite Would be a daily thing, Did not ourselves the cubits warp For fear to be a king. Mara understood now what she would do. She would rise. She would let The Chrysalis glide with unfettered wings toward its own uncertain destiny, but she would not yet let the other Strasser paintings go. Each of the paintings told a story more layered and complex than its provenance alone could ever reveal—a story of the passions, hopes, and dreams of the artist, subject, patron, and owners. Mara would set out to uncover these paintings’ deeper lineages and tie the paintings to their past so they could achieve the full destinies that had been stolen from them. Like the Saint Peter of Michael’s etchings, who had been exhorted that “whatever you bind on earth shall be bound in Heaven, and whatever you loose on earth will be loosed in Heaven,” she would tether their future to their past. thirty-six HAARLEM, 1662 THE BURGOMASTER SEES THEIR LONG GAZES.

And if we do not live according to what we feel is right in our hearts, then what is the point of any of this?" -Jun

An Ancient Prayer to Saint Joseph O SAINT JOSEPH, whose protection is so great, so strong, so prompt before the throne of God, I place in thee all my interests and desires. O Saint Joseph, assist me by thy powerful intercession and obtain for me all spiritual blessings through thy foster Son, Jesus Christ Our Lord, so that, having engaged here below thy heavenly power, I may offer thee my thanksgiving and homage. O Saint Joseph, I never weary contemplating thee and Jesus asleep in thine arms. I dare not approach while He reposes near thy heart, press Him in my name and kiss His fine head for me, and ask Him to return the kiss when I draw my dying breath. Saint Joseph, Patron of departing souls, pray for me.

People feel like they can do something, so they pray to these saints. I can understand that. And even if there are not actual magical spirits listening and waiting to fulfil our wishes, maybe just the act of thinking about these things changes us in some way.

The single greatest influence in our lives was the church. The Catholic Church in the 1960s differs from what it is today, especially in the Naugatuck Valley, in those days an overwhelmingly conservative Catholic place. I was part of what might have been the last generation of American Catholic children who completely and unquestioningly accepted the supernatural as real. Miracles happened. Virgin birth and transubstantiation made perfect sense. Mere humans did in fact, become saints. There was a Holy Ghost. Guardian angels walked beside us and our patron saints really did put in a good word for us every now and then.