Saint of the day

Saint of the day

December 20: Saint Dominic of Silos, Abbot

Renewer of cenobitic life

Saint Dominic Manso, known as de Silos because of his long residence in the monastery that later took his name, was born around the year 1000 in the small Riojan village of Cañas, in Spain. His childhood was spent among pastures and flocks, yet while tending his family’s sheep he began to develop a deep inner attraction to the sacred life. He was welcomed by the local priest, who took him under his care and gradually shaped his formation. At the age of twenty-six, the Bishop of Nájera ordained him to the priesthood.

19 December: Saint Anastasius I, Pope

Defender of the True Faith

Anastasius, Roman by birth and son of a man named Maximus, bore a name which in Greek means “risen.” He was elected Pontiff at the end of 399, after the death of Pope Siricius, and remained at the head of the Church for just two years, until 19 December 401. Despite the brevity of his pontificate, his governance was remarkably intense. He is credited with the construction of the Basilica Crescenziana—identified by tradition with the present-day San Sisto Vecchio—and with a constant work of doctrinal vigilance in years when ancient controversies periodically returned to shake ecclesial unity.

December 18: Saint Gratian (Gatianus) of Tours, Bishop

Evangelizer of Gaul

He was one of the earliest pioneers of the faith in Gaul, a remote foundation of the Christian tradition throughout the region. Gaziano or Graziano—known in ancient sources as Catianus, Gatianus, or Gratianus, and in France as Gatien de Tours—is remembered as the first enduring preacher of the Gospel in the city of Tours and as the founder of its diocese. Information about him is scarce and comes chiefly through the work of Gregory of Tours, the great sixth-century historian, who gathered oral traditions and popular accounts preserved in the Christian memory of Gaul.

17 December: Saint John de Matha

Founder of the Order of the Most Holy Trinity

Saint John de Matha, founder of the Order of the Most Holy Trinity, was born in Faucon—a small Alpine settlement in Provence and a fief tied to the Counts of Barcelona—around the middle of the 12th century, according to sources on 24 June 1154, and according to others on 23 June 1160.

December 16: Saint Adelaide, Empress

A strong and charitable woman

Queen and Empress, she remains to this day one of the brightest figures of the Christian Middle Ages: a strong, generous woman, capable of governing with a degree of competence rarely found even among the chroniclers of her time.

15 December: Saint Valerian of Avensano, Bishop

A defender of the faith until his last breath

On 15 December the liturgical tradition commemorates Saint Valerian, Bishop of the community of Avensano — an ancient diocese of Africa Proconsularis, corresponding to today’s archaeological area of Bordj-Hamdouna (Tunisia), formerly within the archdiocese of Carthage.