Saint Ignatius of Loyola

Ignatius had eleven brothers and sisters and he was born into a very rich family.  When he was a little boy his family sent him to work for King Ferdinand and Queen Isabella; Ignatius dreamed that one day he would become one of the King’s soldiers and marry a beautiful Lady – but God had other wonderful plans for him.  Ignatius did become a soldier, but got injured during battle.  While he was getting better, he had to stay at the hospital and the only thing to do there was read books about Jesus and the lives of the Saints.  Through these books God asked Ignatius to follow him and Ignatius said yes!  His first job was to go back to school in France.  When he finished he became a priest and joined two other men, Blessed Peter Faber and Saint Francis Xavier, and they promised to do whatever the Pope asked of them.  This group of three men started the Society of Jesus (the Jesuits), which is still a large group of priests (30,000 members) who run universities and colleges around the world today.

Saint Peter Chrysologus

Peter was baptized a Christian after being taught by Bishop Cornelius of Imola, the town where Peter was born.  He loved Jesus so much that he was later made a Deacon by Bishop Cornelius too.  Pope Leo the Great, who is also a Saint, made Peter an Archbishop in Italy.  He was an excellent priest and bishop and he helped lots of people believe in God.  Archbishop Peter had a great gift of being able to speak to people in a way that they could understand, everyone loved to hear him speak during mass.  This is why he is called St. Peter Chrysologus, because “chrysologus” means golden word and Peter knew how to share the golden word “the gospel” so well.  He liked to explain really important things about God becoming human in Jesus (the Incarnation), the Creed (which is what we believe as a Church), about Mary, and about John the Baptist.  He also talked a lot about how God sent Jesus His Son to come and save us from sin (Salvation).  The Church thought he was such a great teacher that they named him a Doctor of the Church.

Saint Martha

Martha was Lazarus’ sister, they also had a sister named Mary.  They were all good friends with Jesus and they loved him very much.  Jesus would visit them very often and many people would come to their house to listen to Jesus speak.  Martha wanted to care for all the people that were visiting their home and she worked very hard to cook and serve all of the guests in their home.   Her sister Mary preferred to sit and listen to Jesus speak and this made Martha angry one day.  She asked Jesus to please tell her sister Mary to come and help her because there was so much work to do, but Jesus told Martha that even though her work was important, it was even more important to listen to the word of God.  Martha believed that Jesus was the Messiah and so when her brother got sick she sent someone to get Jesus so that He could heal him. By the time Jesus arrived Lazarus had been dead for 3 days, Martha told Jesus that if he had been there, her brother would not have died.  Jesus said that whoever believed in Him would never die and he asked Martha if she believed Him.  Her faith in Jesus was so great that even though her brother was dead she said yes!  Jesus then raised her brother from the dead!  You can read about Martha and her family in the bible, in the Gospel of John Chapter 11.

Saints Nazarius and Celsus

Nazarius’ dad was a soldier in the Roman army, he did not believe in God; his mother had a very strong faith and even became a Saint, St. Perpetua.  When Nazarius was 9 years old he was baptized because he loved God so much.  He loved God so much that he travelled to lots of countries to tell people about God.  Not everyone wanted to hear about God and sometimes he was not treated very well, but he didn’t let anything stop him and he kept travelling and preaching the Good News.  Ten years after he started his missions, he met a boy named Celsus in France.  Celsus’ mother asked Nazarius to baptize Celsus and to keep him as his disciple, so that he would learn more about God.  From that day forward, Nazarius and Celsus travelled and preached the Gospel to many, many people and so many people became Christians through them.  Wherever they travelled there were people that did not like them and they suffered many things because of their faith in God.  Finally, they were again arrested in Milan and when they refused to offer a sacrifice to the false Gods, they were killed.  When they heard that they were going to die because of their faith, they did not cry, they praised God!  They were so happy that they were finally going to meet Jesus in heaven

Saints Natalie and Aurelius

Natalie and Aurelius were husband and wife.  Both of them became Christians later in their lives, as they were not born to Christian parents.  During the time that they lived, the Moors ruled their country and they did not believe in Jesus.  People were not allowed to worship God and if they did they were killed.  St. Natalie and St. Aurelius were very brave, because even though it was against the law to worship God, they did!  They didn’t worship in secret they were not afraid to show everyone that they followed Jesus.  They were killed because of this strong faith and their friend, a monk from Jerusalem, was killed with them.  Like St. John the Baptist they were beheaded and became martyrs for the faith.

Saints Joachim and Anne

Saints Joachim and Anne were the parents of Mary, the Mother of Jesus and our heavenly mother.  That made them Jesus’ Grandparents!  Joachim and Anne were married for 20 years and they had not been able to have a baby.  They prayed and prayed that God would give them a baby, because they wanted to love a child and raise that child to love God.  God finally did bless them with a very special baby, a little girl who was to become the mother of Jesus.  We know that Joachim and Anne loved God very much, because they shared that faith with their daughter Mary.  They dedicated Mary to God at a very early age, which meant that Mary went to live in the temple for a few years to serve God and learn to love Him more.  By sharing their faith with their daughter Mary, they prepared her to say yes to God when He asked her to be the mother of His Son Jesus.  Joachim and Anne also helped in choosing St. Joseph as Jesus’ adopted father, as they were the ones that made the plans for Mary to become Joseph's wife.  They played such an important part in preparing the way for Jesus to enter the world and become our Saviour!  St. Anne is so loved by Jesus’ followers that they have named many Churches after her.  One of the most famous, and largest of these Churches, is in Quebec, Canada – St. Anne de Beaupre.  Many people make pilgrimages to this Church, asking for St. Anne to help them know Jesus more.

St James the greater

James was one of the first Apostles called by Jesus to “Follow Me”.  He was a fisherman like his father and his brother John was also called to follow Jesus.  Jesus called James and his brother to become fishers of men, which means they would go out and tell people the good news about Jesus and they would help many people become followers of Jesus too.  James was present at some very special moments during Jesus’ life; the miracle of raising Jairus’ daughter from the dead; the transfiguration of Jesus on the mountain; and the agony of Jesus in the garden of Gethsemane.  He was given the gifts of healing and casting out evil spirits from people.  Jesus called St. James, St. Peter and St. John the “Sons of Thunder”, which could mean they had a bit of a temper and were impatient when people didn’t believe in God.   Although St. James was with Jesus in the Garden of Gethsemane, when Jesus was arrested St. James ran away in fear.  After Jesus rose from the dead, he appeared to St. James with the other Apostles and St. James received courage through the Holy Spirit to spread the Good News to many people.  He was killed for his faith in Jesus and is one of the first martyrs of the Church.

Sts Boris & Gleb

Boris and Gleb were brothers and they were the sons of the first Christian Prince of Russia, St. Vladimir of Kiev.  There mother was also a Christian, Anne of Constantinople, so Boris and Gleb were taught about Jesus.  After Boris and Gleb’s father died, they were each given a part of their father’s great kingdom.  Their oldest brother was very greedy and wanted all of his father’s kingdom, so he created a plan to kill his brothers.  Boris was warned that his brother planned to kill him when he returned from battle.  The men that fought at war with Boris wanted to protect him and not let anyone harm him, but Boris would not let them get involved.  He told them that it would be better for him to die alone then to risk the lives of so many men.  So Boris faced his enemies alone and never fought back; he only asked for God’s peace to be with the men that killed him.  Soon after Boris was killed, his oldest brother also sent men to kill Gleb.  Gleb did not know what was happening or why he was being killed, but he also did not fight back, he only prayed to the Lord all throughout his attack.  So the brothers, Boris and Gleb died as martyrs because they accepted death without fighting back, just like Jesus did.   People that have visited their tombs have received miracles through the prayers of these holy brothers.

Saint Bridget of Sweden

Bridget was born to a rich and holy family.  They taught her about Jesus from the time that she was a baby.  When she was a little girl she began to have visions of Jesus, she had many visions of Jesus all throughout her life.  In these visions she saw how much Jesus suffered for us and because of this she tried to help people change their ways and not hurt Jesus through their sins.  She was married to a very holy man who was also a Prince.  They had eight children and one of them also became a Saint, St. Catherine of Sweden.  All throughout her life God appeared to St. Bridget and gave her special messages for very important people, Kings, Popes and priests.  St. Bridget always did what God asked her to do and tried to help other people follow God as well.  Near the end of her life St. Bridget visited the places Jesus lived and died and she saw many amazing visions about what Jesus said and did there.  All of the things Jesus showed her were written in a book after she died, and many people have come to know Jesus more deeply because of her.

Mary Magdelene

Mary did not follow God’s way before meeting Jesus, everyone in town believed she was a very big sinner.  Her whole life changed when she met Jesus.  He forgave her of all her sins and from then on she followed Jesus wherever he went, taking care of him and the Apostles.  Mary Magdalene stayed with Jesus while he was crucified, even when all His Apostles, except for John, ran away because they were scared.  Mary stayed at the foot of the cross with Jesus.  On the third day after Jesus had been laid in the tomb, Mary went to the tomb to take care of Jesus’ body. When she got there, she found the tomb empty.  Instead she saw two angles sitting where Jesus’ body should have been.  The angles asked her why she was crying and she said, “They have taken my Lord away, and I do not know where they have put him.”  She saw a man outside the tomb and thought that it was the gardener.  She asked him if he had taken Jesus’ body from the tomb, and when the man looked at her and said her name, she knew right away that it was Jesus!  Jesus was alive and appeared to Mary Magdalene first.  He told her to go and tell the apostles that He was alive and she shared the Good News!

St Lawrence of Brindisi

St. Lawrence was named Ceasar Rossi when he was born.  He was very close to God his whole life and felt that God was calling him to be His servant.  So when Ceasar turned 16 years old, he became a Franciscan Capuchin and took the name Brother Lawrence.  He was sent to study and was a very good student, he even learned how to speak 6 different languages.  St. Lawrence became a priest and could speak to so many people because of all the languages he had learned.  He did many amazing things as a priest.  When he went to Austria to start up a Franciscan house there, the Emperor asked him to help convince the princes of Austria to fight in a battle against the Turks.  The princes listened to St. Lawrence but asked if he would go with them; St. Lawrence ended up leading the princes in battle carrying only a cross to defend himself.  He also helped bring peace between Germany and Spain, helping all the people that lived there have a better life.  He gave many amazing homilies, which were made into books after he died.  Pope John XXIII thought his words were pretty amazing and proclaimed him an Apostolic Doctor of the Church.

St Joseph Barsabba

After Jesus died, the 11 Apostles wanted to choose someone to replace Judas as the twelfth Apostle.  They wanted someone who could help spread the Good News about what Jesus had done for us.  They wanted this person to have been a disciple of Jesus from the beginning.  Someone who was with them from the time that Jesus started his public ministry, until his death and resurrection.  Jesus’ followers had two people to choose from, one was St. Joseph (who they also called Barsabba) and the other person was Matthias.  The 11 Apostles picked Matthias to replace Judas, but this did not stop St. Joseph from spreading the Good News of Jesus’ death and resurrection to as many people as he could.

St Boniface of Lausanne

St. Boniface was a very well educated boy, taught by Cistercian nuns as a little boy in Belgium and then studied more in Paris.  He was a teacher and then became a priest and then Bishop of Lausanne in Switzerland.  He was Bishop in Switzerland for nine years, but then he had to stop because he made the Emperor mad by telling everyone how badly the Emperor and the priests were living in Switzerland.  He spent the rest of his life in the Cistercian convent, with the nuns who taught him as a little boy.

St Frederick

Frederick’s grandpa was a King, so he came from a very important family.  Frederick could have been anything he wanted, but he chose to be a priest. He worked hard to become a really good priest and, because of this, he was put in charge of taking care of all the new people coming into the Church.  He was later made Bishop of Utrecht, where he really cared for his people. He made sure that there was a lot of missionary work being done to spread the Good News of God’s love to everyone.  Not everyone liked Bishop Frederick, because they did not believe in God and they did not like that he wanted them to believe.  So one day, he was killed by two people that did not like him, but He died praising God.

St Leo IV

Leo was born and raised in Rome; when he grew up he became a priest.  He was the Priest of St. John Lateran’s, which is a very big and very famous basilica in Rome.  It is such a special Church that it is called an Archbasilica, because it is the cathedral of the Bishop of Rome.  During Leo’s life, there were two Popes who died very close together, Pope Gregory IV and Pope Sergius II; both these Popes loved Leo and thought he was a wonderful priest.  After Pope Sergius died, Leo was chosen to be the next Pope.  As Pope, Leo made sure that the city of Rome was very well protected, as there were barbarians (the Saracens) who wanted to attack it.  He made sure the walls around the city were made stronger so they could not be attacked.  He helped priests to live more holy and prayerful lives, by creating rules for them to follow.  Pope Leo stood up to many priests and bishops who wanted to live their own way and make their own rules, but he did not change the rules that he knew were right.  Everyone loved Pope Leo IV because he took good care of God's Church. God also performed many miracles through His humble servant, Pope Leo IV.

Our Lady of Mount Carmel

Mount Carmel is in Galilee, which is the province where the town of Nazareth was, where Jesus grew up.  Mount Carmel is also where the prophet Elijah showed people who did not believe in God how powerful God really is.  In the first Book of Kings Elijah built an altar and offers a sacrifice to God, then he poured water over everything and asked God to take the offering.  God sent down fire from heaven and burnt everything, even the stones that the altar was made of, even though it was all wet.  The power of God was experienced by over 800 people that day.  Hundreds of years after Elijah, and after Jesus’ life and death, a group of monks lived on Mount Carmel.  They loved Mary so much that they named their group, the friars of the Blessed Virgin Mary of Mount Carmel, this is how the Carmelite order started, which is still around today.  This group of monks was not liked because of their faith in  God, so they prayed that Mary would help them.  On July 16, in the year 1251, Mary appeared to one of the leaders of the monks, St. Simon Stock, and she gave him a brown scapular to wear; promising him that she would take care of all those who wore it.  Today people wear a scapular medal or necklace and trust that Mary will protect them too.

St Bonavenure

When Bonaventure was a baby he became very sick, so his mother asked St. Francis of Assisi to come and pray for him to get better.  As St. Francis prayed he knew that Bonaventure would become a great person and so he said “O Buona Ventura” which means “O good fortune!”.  That is why his mother called him Bonaventure!  When he grew up he became a Franciscan priest.  He was sent to Paris along with his friend St Thomas Aquinas, to study with some great teachers.  He had many important jobs in the Church during his life; one of the most important was being the Cardinal and Bishop of Albano, which is one of the Sees of Rome. Because of all of his great work within the Church, he is considered one of the Doctors of the Catholic Church. 

St Kateri

Kateri was born in an Aboriginal village which is now part of New York State.  She was born in a village where very few people believed in Jesus.  Both her parents died of small pox when she was very young. Kateri also had small pox but survived; she was therefore raised by her Uncle.  Jesuit missionaries had come to Kateri’s village 10 years before she was born to share the good news with the people there, but they were killed because of their faith in God.  Some people did become Christians and were living the Christian faith very quietly in the village, so that they would not be hurt by those who did not believe.  When Kateri was still very young, Jesuit missionaries came to visit her Uncle and they spoke about Jesus and prayed with her family.  This was the time that Kateri got to know who Jesus was and she started to have faith in Him.  When she turned 18 she was baptized and devoted her life to God, even though she knew it would be difficult to live for Christ when so few people around her believed.  Things became so difficult that Kateri left her village and joined a Christian village near Montreal, in Canada.  There she was able to live out that last few years of her life as a devoted Christian.  She became sick after being in Canada for 3 years and almost lost all her sight, but she did not let anything stop her from praising God for all He had done for her.  After she died many miracles happened through St. Kateri’s prayers.  Kateri became a Saint on October 21, 2012.

St Henry II

Henry was the son of the Duke of Bavaria.  When Henry was a boy he went to school and studied with Bishop Wolfgang of Regensburg.  Henry wanted to become a priest, but when his father died he became the Duke and had an important job to do.  One night he had a dream and St. Wolfgang, the Bishop who was Henry teacher, appeared to him and pointed to the words “after six”.  Henry was confused as to what this could mean.  He thought maybe it meant that in six days he was going to heaven, so he prayed lots and asked God to prepare him for heaven.  But after six days he was still alive.  So then he thought maybe it meant that after six months he would die, so again he tried to live a very good life and pray lots to prepare to go to heaven, but after six months, he was perfectly healthy.  Then he thought maybe the Bishop meant six years, but again after six years he was healthy.  Not only was he healthy, he was made the Emperor of Germany.  Finally Henry knew what his dream meant, he had and even more important job to do.  As the ruler of Germany he had many people to take care of.  He did such a good job, that the Pope Benedict VIII made him and his wife the Emperors of the Holy Roman Empire.

St John Gaulbert

St. John was called Giovanni (which is Italian for John) when he was born.  His mom and dad did not follow Jesus.  His brother was killed by one of Giovanni’s friends, and this made him and his dad very mad.  Giovanni was so mad that he wanted to kill the man who killed his brother.  When he had the chance to kill him, his friend begged Giovanni to forgive him for the love of Jesus, who died for us.  Even though it was very hard, Giovanni walked away from him and found a Church.  At the Church he knelt in front of the cross and asked Jesus to forgive him for hating the man who killed his brother.  The statue of Jesus on the cross, bowed down to him, and said that he was forgiven.  From that moment Giovanni believed in God and gave his whole life to Jesus.  He joined the Benedictine monks and later started his own community of monks, who spent their time helping the poor.

St Benedict of Nursia

Benedict was born into a rich family that taught him about God and living a holy life.  They sent him to Rome to get a good education, but he became very sad with all the sin that he saw happening in Rome.  He left Rome and became a hermit, living in a cave for three years and getting closer to Jesus.  Even though Benedict wanted to be alone with God a community of monks asked him to come and lead their Abbot, because they saw how holy he was. This didn’t last very long, because they didn’t like how Benedict wanted to live, they thought it was too hard.  They tried to poison Benedict, but God protected him and he left their community and went back to the cave.  Then God lead him to Monte Cassino where he converted the people there back to Jesus; destroying the pagan temple they had built there.  This is where Benedict built his most famous monastery and where he started the Benedictine order of monks.  Many men joined the monastery and became Benedictine monks, and this way of life spread throughout the world.  Even today there are many Benedictine brothers and priests around the world.  The monks work to bring people back to Jesus, help people live holy lives and help the poor around them. 

St Felicity

Felicity lived in Rome with her husband and her seven sons.  She lived a very good life, worshiping and serving the one true God and helping those in need.  She lead many people to Jesus through her faith and example.  Her husband died before her, but she continued to lead a faithful life doing what God asked of her.  This made the priests who worshiped false gods in Rome very angry.  They became so angry because of her faith that one day they arrested her and her seven sons.  They ordered her to make sacrifices to their false gods, but she said no way!  They tried to force her, but she never gave in.  Then they told her that they would kill each of her sons if she did not obey, but even then she said no, because she knew that if her sons did what God asked of them, they would all be together in heaven.  She suffered a lot as she watched all of her sons being killed and then 4 months later she was also killed.  Through all of this, she trusted in God and put her hope in him that all of their suffering would be over when they were reunited in heaven.

St Veronica Juliani

St. Veronica was named Ursula when she was born, and took the name Veronica when she entered a Capuchin convent when she was only 17 years old.  Even as a small child she was always thinking about God and doing acts of mercy for the poor around her.  She told her parents at a very young age that she wanted to join the convent, and even though her dad wanted her to get married, he finally agreed to let her go.  On the day she joined the convent, the Bishop told the leader of the convent that one day Veronica would be a Saint.  She is called a mystic of the Church, which means she was given very special gifts from God.  One of these gifts she received was that she was given the same wounds that Jesus got when he died on the cross; this is called the stigmata. She got holes in her hands and feet where Jesus was nailed to the cross, a hole in her side where they pierced Jesus with a sword and scrapes on her forehead where Jesus was hurt by the crown of thorns.  This gift reminded her how much Jesus suffered because He loved us so much and he wanted us to be in heaven with him.  She also received beautiful visions from God, pictures that she could see, but no body else could.  After she died her body did not go away, it stayed just as beautiful as when she was alive.

Saint Priscilla

Priscilla was married to Aquila, who was a Jewish tentmaker.  They were forced to leave Rome when the Emperor, Claudius, kicked all the Jewish people out of Rome.  They went to live in Corinth, where they met Saint Paul who told them about Jesus – they became one of the early Christians.  After becoming Christians, they traveled with Paul sharing the Gospel.  They went to Rome and helped many people learn about God and their house was even used as a Church.  They also went to Ephesus and Asia Minor.  They died as martyrs, because of their faith in God.  St. Paul spoke about them in his letter to the Romans in the Bible (Rom. 16: 3-4) and he loved them very much.

Blessed Maria Menesis

Maria had 7 brothers and sisters.  She was very smart and was a talented artist and musician; she played the piano ad violin.  When she was 12 years old got really sick, and was sick for a whole year.  While she was sick she, and those around her, asked Mary to ask God to heal her.  God performed a miracle and she got better.  This miracle made Maria love God and his mother Mary very much, and she decided to become a sister with the Salesian order.   In 1920, at 18 years old, she joined the “Daughters of Mary, Help of Christians”.  In 1931 she went to Costa Rica and worked with many poor girls teaching them art and music and most importantly about God.  Through her example, many girls also became nuns and served the poor with her. 

St Maria Goretti

Maria was born into a loving family who was very poor.  She had 5 brothers and sisters and the whole family loved God very much.  In order to provide for the family, Maria’s family moved to a large farm with another farmer and his 16 year old son, Mr. Serenelli and Allessandro.  Maria worked very hard to help her family and she grew up to be a very kind, loving and beautiful girl whom everyone loved.  Since she was so beautiful, Allessandro started to notice her and tried to make her do things with him that were sinful.  Maria always said no and this made Allessandro very mad.  On July 5th 1902 Allessandro got so mad at Maria because she would not do what he wanted and sin against God, so he killed her.  Before Maria died she told the priest that she forgave Allessandro for all the bad things he did to her and she prayed that God would forgive him too.  Allessandro was put in jail for 30 years and for a long time he was not sorry for what he did, until one night in a dream Maria appeared to him.  She was walking in a garden and gave him lilies.  She told him that she would like to see him in heaven one day.  When Allessandro woke up he became so sorry for what he did and asked God for forgiveness; when he was let out of prison he also asked Maria’s mom for forgiveness.  He spent the rest of his life as a gardener at a monastery.  

St Anthony Zacharia

Anthony’s dad died when he was very little, so growing up it was just him and his mom and they were very close.  Anthony loved helping people that were sick and poor and so his mother thought that he would make a good doctor.  Anthony became a doctor and started helping lots of people.  Even though Anthony liked being a doctor and helping people, he loved God so much that he wanted to be a priest.  After becoming a priest, he still kept helping people and he started an order of priests called the Clerks Regular of St. Paul.  He also started an order of sisters called the Angelics of St. Paul.  Anthony loved St. Paul and studied the letters that he wrote a lot because they brought him closer to God.  He and his priests taught people about the teachings in Paul’s letters in simple ways so that they could understand and grow closer to God.  Anthony got sick while spreading the Good News of God to many people; he never stopped sharing about how much God loves us.

St Elizabeth of Portugal

Elizabeth was a Spanish princess who married the King of Portugal, King Denis, this made her the Queen of Portugal.  Elizabeth was beautiful and she was always generous, kind and loving.  For a long time her husband did lots of bad things and didn’t love his wife, Queen Elizabeth, very well.  Even though he treated her poorly, Queen Elizabeth never stopped loving her husband and praying that he would get to know God and be sorry for his sins.  She spent her time taking care of her kids and helping the poor of Portugal.  Because of her prayer and love King Denis slowly started to change his ways.  He asked Queen Elizabeth to forgive him for all the bad things he had done to her and he asked God to forgive him.  He lived the rest of his life doing good.  Because of her goodness Queen Elizabeth was able to bring peace to Portugal and even stopped two wars from starting.  When King Denis died, she sold off her riches and she joined the Franciscan order; opening a monastery for the Poor Clares (an order of sisters who live with the poor and cared for them).  After Queen Elizabeth died, many people asked for her prayers and God performed many miracles because of peoples’ faith.

St Thomas

Thomas was one of Jesus’ 12 apostles, Jesus’ closest friends when he was living on earth.  Thomas loved Jesus very much and followed him very closely while he was with them, but when Jesus was crucified Thomas lost his courage and hid because he was afraid that the Romans would want to kill him too.  On Easter Sunday when Jesus rose from the dead and appeared to his apostles, Thomas wasn’t there and he didn’t believe the apostles when they told him that Jesus was alive.  Thomas said he couldn’t believe unless he saw Jesus himself.  Eight days after Jesus rose from the dead Jesus appeared to the apostles again and this time Thomas was there too.  Jesus told Thomas to come and see him and touch his hands and feet that had been nailed to the cross.  Thomas ran to Jesus and fell down at his feet and cried, “My Lord and my God”.  Jesus reminded Thomas that he needed to believe in God even when he can’t see him.  Jesus said that we would be blessed if we believed in Him even without seeing Him, this is called faith.  With this new faith Thomas took the Good News of Jesus’ resurrection to many people.  He died a martyr because he never stopped spreading the Good News.

St Otto

Soon after Otto became a priest he was asked to serve in the court of Emperor Henry IV, he later became the Chancellor for the Emperor, which means he helped the Emperor make decisions.  Otto worked really hard to help the Emperor make good decisions for his people, but the Emperor made many bad decisions, even picking his own Pope because he didn’t like the decisions that the real Pope was making.  Otto did the best job he could serving the Emperor and then his son Henry V, who really respected Otto and listened to his advice.  Otto was made a Bishop and was asked by King Boleslaus III of Poland to go on a mission to bring the Good News of Jesus to some of his people in a country called Prussia.  These people did not know God and Bishop Otto helped them to give their life to God.  He brought Jesus to 20,000 people there and they were baptized.  He started more than 20 monasteries, built lots of churches and worked really hard to heal the relationship between the King and the Pope.

Blessed Junipero Serra

Blessed Junipero was named Miguel Jose when he was born, he took the name Junipero when he became a brother with the Franciscans at 17 years old.  Junipero was a good friend of St. Francis.  As Junipero studied to become a priest, he read a lot of stories of the Saints. The ones he loved the most were the saints who were missionaries and brought the Good News of Jesus to those who had never heard it before.  He decided that if God would allow it, he would become a missionary.  After 20 years of being a priest and a teacher he was allowed to go to “New Spain” (now Mexico and California) to bring Jesus to the people living there.  It was a long journey across the Atlantic Ocean in a boat and the Friars finally arrived in Mexico on December 6, 1749.  Not long after they arrived Junipero was bit by an insect that made his leg swell up and made it difficult for him to walk.  Junipero never complained and he walked far and wide to make sure that many people heard about Jesus and gave their life to Him.  Junipero started 21 missions in Mexico and later in California, they told people about God, they took care of their needs and taught them many things about farming and other important things needed to live.  His missions baptized 6,000 people who got to know Jesus because Junipero said yes to God’s call.