SAINT FEAST DAY FOR EVERY DAY OF THE YEAR

  ALL SAINTS CELEBRATED IN JANUARY Saints celebrated on the 12th of January WELCOME! SAINT MARGUERITE BOURGEOYS, VIRGIN AND FOUNDRESS Saint Marguerite Bourgeoys, a French religious sister and foundress of the Congregation of Notre Dame of Montreal in today's Canada, was born on April 17, 1620 in Troyes, France, as the sixth of twelve children. Attached to the monastery in Troyes was the confraternity of the Congregation Notre-Dame, which had been founded in 1597 by Alix Le Clerk , dedicated to the education of the poor. The canonesses of the monastery helped the poor, but remained cloistered. They were not allowed to teach outside the cloister. To reach poor young girls who could not afford to board within the cloister as students, they relied upon a sodality, whose members they would educate in both religion and pedagogy. Marguerite decided at about age 15 to join the sodality affiliated with the congregation. In 1652 Paul de Chomedey, Sieur de Maisonneuve, the Governor of the Fre...

  ALL SAINTS CELEBRATED IN OCTOBER Saints celebrated on the 25th of October SAINT MARGARET OF ROSKILDE, MARTYR Saint Margaret (Margarita) is found with the addition: Roskilde (Roschild, Roskildiæ) in Denmark , in the index at Potthast * (Suppl. p. 229). She lived and died in Ølishøve near Køge on the east coast of Zealand [Sjælland]. The year of her death is 1176. She was killed by her husband. Her body was buried in the main church at Roskilde by Bishop Absalon , her relative. (XI. 713-720). (Information from Stadler's Complete Encyclopedia of Saints, Volume 4, Augsburg, 1875) *A hagiography source used by the authors  Stadler's Complete Encyclopedia of Saints - Sources and Abbreviations PRAYER: Grant, we beseech you, almighty God, that the venerable feast of Saint Margaret may increase our devotion and promote our salvation. Through our Lord Jesus Christ, your Son, who lives and reigns with you in the unity of the Holy Spirit, God, for ever and ever. Amen.

  ALL SAINTS CELEBRATED IN MARCH Saints celebrated on the 26th of March WELCOME! SAINT MARGARET CLITHEROW, MARTYR   ⬅️ Forty Holy Martyrs of England and Wales Margaret Clitherow  was born as Margaret Middleton. The daughter of a wax chandler, she married a butcher called John Clitherow when she was 15 years old in 1571. They had three children. When Margaret was 18 she converted to Catholicism, although her husband, while supportive of his wife, remained Protestant. SHE BECAME A FRIEND OF PERSECUTED CATHOLICS Margaret became a friend of persecuted Catholics in the north of England. Her son, Henry, trained at Reims [seminaries and Catholic churches were outlawed in England for several centuries] in order to become a Catholic priest and they regularly held [clandestine] Masses at her home in York. In the event of a raid, there was a hole in her attic that enabled priests to escape to the adjoining house. The house believed to have been hers is now called the Shrine of the S...

  ALL SAINTS CELEBRATED IN JANUARY Saints celebrated on the 18th of January WELCOME! SAINT MARGARET OF HUNGARY, PRINCESS AND VIRGIN She was the daughter of King Bela I of Hungary and his wife Marie Laskaris, she was born in 1242 and died January 18, 1271.  HER PARENTS VOWED THAT THEIR NEXT CHILD SHOULD BE DEDICATED TO RELIGION According to a vow which her parents made when Hungary was liberated from the Tatars that their next child should be dedicated to religion, Margaret, in 1245 entered the Dominican Convent of Veszprem.  Invested with the habit at the age of four, she was transferred in her tenth year to the Convent of the Blessed Virgin founded by her parents on the Hasen Insel (an isle) near Buda, the Margareten Insel near Budapest today, and where the ruins of the convent are still to be seen. Here Margaret passed all her life, which was consecrated to contemplation and penance, and was venerated as a saint during her lifetime.  SHE APPEARS TO HAVE TAKEN SOLEM...

  ALL SAINTS CELEBRATED IN NOVEMBER Saints celebrated on the 16th of November   WELCOME! SAINT MARGARET OF SCOTLAND, CONFESSOR   Born, perhaps in Hungary, in 1045, Margaret took refuge in the court of Malcolm III of Scotland after the Battle of Hastings. She married him in 1070. She lived with great piety, spending her time in prayer and fasting, caring for the poor. She used her position to reform the abuse of the time, and had synods held to this end. The Church of the Holy Trinity at Dunfermline was founded at her benefaction. PRAYER: God our Father, you gave Saint Margaret of Scotland a special love for the poor. Let her example and prayers help us to become a living sign of your goodness. Through our Lord Jesus Christ, your Son, who lives and reigns with you in the unity of the Holy Spirit, God, for ever and ever. Amen. *** “SERVING ORPHANS FOOD AND WASHING THE FEET OF THE POOR” Margaret had grown up in a turbulent period for England. Her father, Edward the Exile, wa...

  ALL SAINTS CELEBRATED IN AUGUST Saints celebrated on the 30th of August WELCOME! SAINT MARGARET WARD, MARTYR ⬅️ Forty Holy Martyrs of England and Wales St Margaret Ward, martyr, was born at Congleton, Cheshire. Nothing is known of her early life except that she was of good family and for a time dwelt in the house of a lady of distinction named Whitall then residing in London.  SHE FURNISHED HIM WITH A CORD WHETEBY HE COULD MAKE HIS ESCAPE Knowing that William Watson, the priest who wrote the work known as the "Quodlibets", was imprisoned, she obtained permission to visit him. After several visits she disarmed the vigilance of the gaoler and furnished him with a cord whereby he could make his escape. At the appointed time the boatman whom she had engaged to convey the priest down the river refused to carry out his bargain, and in her distress she confided her difficulty to a young man, Venerable John Roche (or Neele), who undertook to assist her. He provided a boat and excha...

  ALL SAINTS CELEBRATED IN APRIL Saints celebrated on the 13th of April WELCOME! SAINT MARGARET OF CASTELLO, VIRGIN  Blessed* Margaret of Castello was born into a noble family at Metola Castle, Italy, in 1287. Blessed Margaret was born blind and with a curvature of her spine. She was four foot tall and had great difficulty walking.  HER PARENTS HID HER BECAUSE SHE WAS DISABLED Her parents were embarrassed at Blessed Margaret and hid her in the castle, not letting others see her. The parents eventually abandoned Blessed Margaret at the local church and a pious couple took her into their home.  A PIOUS COUPLE TOOK HER INTO THEIR HOME Blessed Margaret grew in faith and she confided to a priest that every time she attended Mass she saw Jesus on the altar. The priest suggested that perhaps it was that she was just sensing Jesus, but Blessed Margaret insisted that she saw Jesus. When asked by the priest to say what Jesus looked like, Blessed Margaret replied, "Oh Father, y...

  ALL SAINTS CELEBRATED IN FEBRUARY Saints celebrated on the 22nd of February WELCOME! SAINT MARGARET OF CORTONA, PENITENT Saint Margaret of Cortona was a native of Alviano, in Tuscany. The harshness of a step-mother, and her own indulged propensity to vice, cast her headlong into the greatest disorders. The sight of the carcass of a man, half putrefied, who had been her gallant, struck her with so great a fear of the divine judgments, and with so deep a sense of the treachery of this world, that she in a moment became a perfect penitent.  A HARROWING EXPERIENCE The first thing she did was to throw herself at her father’s feet, bathed in tears, to beg his pardon for her contempt of his authority and fatherly admonitions. She spent the days and nights in tears, and to repair the scandal she had given by her crimes, she went to the parish church of Alviano, with a rope about her neck, and there asked public pardon for them. After this she repaired to Cortona, and made her most p...