Comments on: Top 5 weirdest patron saints

By: Julia

Julia — Sat, 16 Feb 2008 11:48:56 +0000

Actually Saints do get “removed” all the time. Particularly in medevial and early christian times, the qualifications for sainthood were kind of lax and could be based on a possibly, sort of, less than totally true story. i.e. he floated across a river on a leaf, let’s make him a saint! Today, the Vatican periodically goes through and culls out saints whose stories aren’t so solid, in order to make sure that sainthood remains reserved for the truly saintly.

St. Christopher wasn’t exactly removed but he was significantly demoted. His story about carrying the child who ended up being Jesus was judged to be less of a true account and more of a widespread legend, and it was determined that the actual “St. Christopher” was really just a Roman martyr who had died with a bunch of other martyrs and not a person with a special story. So he was removed from the feast day calendar and also from the names of churches. Bummer.

By: W.E.B. Adamant

W.E.B. Adamant — Sat, 16 Feb 2008 01:29:51 +0000

Another good one: Padre Pio is the (unofficial) patron of the New Year’s Blues.

By: Samantha

Samantha — Fri, 15 Feb 2008 21:54:13 +0000

Don’t forget St. Clare of Assissi. She’s the patron saint of television, because once when she was too sick to go to mass she was able to see it on her wall.

By: JohnD

JohnD — Fri, 15 Feb 2008 19:30:41 +0000

Saints do not get removed. However they may have their special Day removed (like St Christopher)

By: silentluciditi

silentluciditi — Thu, 25 Oct 2007 19:45:54 +0000

We had the same teacher for church youth group classes for three years and by the third she’d had enough of us. Each year we chose a patron saint for our classroom, and the year before our last with her we’d chosen Joan of Arc and put on a wonderful skit about her that included tying up one of our classmates and setting her on ‘fire’ (red paper flames). This might have been why she was fed up with us. She chose our saint our last year, and he’s always been my favourite, and appropriate for that class- St. Jude, the patron said of lost causes.

By: Doc

Doc — Thu, 25 Oct 2007 16:48:32 +0000

I remember reading that the Buddha was accidentally canonized as St. Jehosophat. Help, anybody?

FWIW: I was baptismally given the middle name of ‘Francis’, named for he of Assisi. I’m not, nor have ever been, a practicing Catholic, but always thought that name was was pretty cool. He taught a strict adherance to poverty and chastity (I’m poor -limited retirement income – and never get laid), and talked to birds. My back yard is full of bird feeders and I spend hours out there with my little buddies. When they hold the annual Blessing of the Animals, it is he who is invoked.

As another aside, the Dominican Order, not the Jesuits, was/is in charge of The Inquisition. Dunno what that has to do with astronomers, other than they weren’t real happy with Galileo.

They never closed down that office, BTW.

By: Art Waite

Art Waite — Thu, 25 Oct 2007 16:47:03 +0000

St. Leonard – Patron Saint of shooters – he defended a group of pilgims from bandits with his pistols in fiftenth(?) century Italy.

By: Lori L.

Lori L. — Thu, 25 Oct 2007 14:40:47 +0000

I was named for St. Lawrence, at the prodding of Father Lawrence Smith, who worked at the hospital where I was born. A charming and hilarious man, he always joked that St. Lawrence was the patron saint of football–he died on the gridiron, didn’t he?

By: Meagan

Meagan — Thu, 25 Oct 2007 14:17:33 +0000

What’s wrong with weird? I think that’s one of the reasons I love being Catholic. I can look up to weird people, hehehe. :-)

By: Sweet Pea

Sweet Pea — Thu, 25 Oct 2007 13:53:07 +0000

I remember reading a book as a kid about Saint Cono and how he could help you interpret your dreams and hit the lotto.
I’m thinking he became the Patron Saint of dreams because his parents (who were odler in years and sterile) both dreamnt on the same night about the fact that they were going to finally have a child.

But in the end he never helped me hit the lotto.