Saints' Feast Days – February
FEBRUARY
THE SACRED PASSION
The month of February is dedicated to the
Sacred Passion of Our Lord. This is the month when Lent begins. Lent is a period
of time set aside to specifically commemorate Jesus' Passion, Death and
Resurrection. Ash Wednesday is the day we start off through fasting and
repentance. Penitents are blessed with ashes and reflect on conversion that they
need in their life. They promise amendment and focus on one thing to change, and
for forty days they practice that change. It takes about thirty days to break a
bad habit, so this structured forty days helps it to become a permanent change.
Now the Church hasn't arranged the season of Lent to force a sinner to repent, or for gruesome reflections on Christ's Passion, rather it is offered because of the love relationship between Christ and His members. The Church sees Lent as an opportunity for her members to be better lovers to Our Lord.
Contents
- Saint Brigid of Ireland February 1st
- Saint Josephine Bakhita Virgin, February 8th
- Saint Scholastica Virgin, February 10th
- Saint José Luis Sánchez del Río February 10th
- Our Lady of Lourdes February 11th
- Saint Jacinta Marto February 20th
- Saint Francisco Marto February 20th
- Chair of St. Peter the Apostle February 22nd
Saint Brigid of Ireland
Background:
Brigid and her mother were said to have been slaves in fifth-century Ireland; her father was believed to have been an Irish chieftain. After many years, Brigid and her mother were given their freedom. Now Brigid had the time to devote herself entirely to serving God. Brigid established the first convent in Ireland. The convent educated women and trained them to recognize and respond to the needs of the poor. She taught her nuns this saying: “What is mine is theirs.” It was meant to help them remember that God calls us to share our blessings with others. Brigid also founded the first double monastery in Ireland. It was a place of training and prayer for both monks and nuns. Because of her great charity and her work for the education of priests and nuns, the Church in Ireland experienced great growth. She also founded a school of art, which produced beautiful illuminated manuscripts of the Gospels.
Her Feast Day is 1st February.
Intercessory Prayer:
O Glorious St. Bridget,
Patroness of Ireland and Mother of the Churches, protect the Irish Church and preserve the true Faith in every Irish heart, at home and abroad.
St Bridget, obtain for me the grace to walk faithfully in the path of Christian perfection during life, and so to secure a holy and happy death, with life everlasting, in your blessed company.
[Share your request…]
Merciful God, graciously grant my request but only if it is for Your greater honour and glory, and the salvation of my soul. I ask this through Jesus Christ, our Lord. Amen.
Saint Bridget of Kildare, Pray for us.
Saint Josephine Bakhita
Background:
For many years, Josephine Bakhita was a slave but her spirit was always free and eventually that spirit prevailed. Her Baptism set her on an eventual path toward asserting her civic freedom and then service to God's people as a Canossian Sister. She who worked under many “masters” was finally happy to address God as “master” and carry out everything that she believed to be God's will for her.
Her Feast Day is 8th February.
Note: St Josephine Bakhita is the patron saint of victims of modern slavery and human trafficking. On her feast day Catholics are encouraged to pray for all those affected by the crimes of modern slavery and human trafficking, and the people that volunteer and work to eradicate this crime.
Intercessory Prayer:
St. Josephine Bakhita,
You were sold into slavery as a child and endured untold hardship and suffering. Once liberated from your physical enslavement, you found true redemption in your encounter with Christ and his Church.
O St. Bakhita, assist all those who are trapped in a state of slavery; Intercede with God on their behalf so that they will be released from their chains of captivity. Those whom man enslaves, let God set free.
Provide comfort to survivors of slavery and let them look to you as an example of hope and faith. Help all survivors find healing from their wounds.
We ask for your prayers and intercessions for those enslaved among us. Amen.
Saint Scholastica
Background:
Twins often share the same interests and ideas with an equal intensity. Therefore, it is no surprise that Scholastica and her twin brother, Benedict, established religious communities within a few miles from each other.
On one occasion, as evening fell, Benedict prepared to return to the monastery from which, according to his own Rule, he was not permitted to be absent overnight. Scholastica begged him to stay over so that they could continue their holy conversation. When Benedict refused, Scholastica wept and prayed and immediately such a torrent of rain fell that no one could leave the house. Scholastica's prayers prevailed with God because her love was the greater. Three days later she died, and her holy brother beheld her soul in a vision as it ascended into heaven. Her Feast Day is 10th February.
I asked you and you would not listen; so I asked my God and He did listen.
-St. Scholastica
Intercessory Prayer:
O God,
to show us where innocence leads,
you made the soul of your virgin Saint Scholastica
soar to heaven like a dove in flight.
Grant through her merits and her prayers
that we may so live in innocence
as to attain to joys everlasting.
This we ask through our Lord Jesus Christ,
your Son, who lives and reigns with you
and the Holy Spirit, God, forever and ever.
Amen.
Saint José Luis Sánchez del Río
Known as “Joselito”
Background:
José loved his faith and grew up with a strong devotion to Our Lady of Guadalupe. When José was twelve years old, the Cristero Wars began in Mexico.
During this period in history the Mexican government persecuted the Catholic Church by seizing property, closing religious schools and convents, and executing Catholic priests.
Even though he was too young to join the rebellion, José desperately wanted to be a Cristero and stand up for his faith. He was eventually allowed to join the effort as a flag bearer. During a battle José was captured and was asked to deny his faith and the Cristero cause. José refused and was tortured terribly. As José was forced to walk through town, he recited the rosary, prayed for his enemies, sang songs to Our Lady of Guadalupe, and proclaimed, “I will never give in. Vivo Cristo Rey y Santa Maria de Guadalupe!” His Feast Day is 10th February.
Intercessory Prayer:
O Saint José,
Littlest soldier of Christ,
whose last bloody steps brought you to
the arms of our Lady and our Lord,
keep healthy and strong the steps of our Lord's soldiers
who remain here on earth,
such that they may have your strength
to endure and persevere to the end.
Amen.
…“Vivo Cristo Rey y Santa Maria de Guadalupe!”…
Our Lady of Lourdes
Background:
Mid-19th century Europe was wounded by lack of faith. Sceptics denied the reality of miracles. God answered them with the miracles at Lourdes, the same sort of unexplainable healings that Jesus worked in his public life.
Over the past century God has intervened on countless occasions through the intercession of Our Lady of Lourdes*.* Besides going on pilgrimage to the shrine in France, many have been healed from afar, simply by praying to the Virgin Mary.
Below is a novena prayer to Our Lady of Lourdes that can be prayed for nine consecutive days for the healing of a friend or family member, or maybe your own personal healing.
Novena Prayer:
Be blessed, O most pure Virgin, for having vouchsafed to manifest your shining with life, sweetness and beauty, in the Grotto of Lourdes, saying to the child, St. Bernadette: “I am the Immaculate Conception.” A thousand times we congratulate you upon your Immaculate Conception. And now, O ever Immaculate Virgin, Mother of mercy, Health of the sick, Refuge of sinners, Comforter of the afflicted, you know our wants, our troubles, our sufferings; deign to cast upon us a look of mercy.
By appearing in the Grotto of Lourdes, you were pleased to make it a privileged sanctuary, whence you dispense your favors, and already many have obtained the cure of their infirmities, both spiritual and physical. We come, therefore, with the most unbounded confidence to implore your maternal intercession. Obtain for us, O loving Mother, the granting of our request.
(state your request)
Through gratitude for your favors, we will endeavor to imitate your virtues, that we may one day share your glory. Our Lady of Lourdes, Mother of Christ, you had influence with your divine son while upon earth. You have the same influence now in Heaven. Pray for us; obtain for us from your Divine Son our special requests if it be the Divine Will. Amen.
Our Lady of Lourdes, pray for us.
Saint Bernadette, pray for us.
Saint Jacinta Marto
Background:
Francisco (1908-1919) and Jacinta (1910–1920) Marto were siblings and the youngest of the three shepherd children, who, along with their cousin, Lucia Santos, witnessed three apparitions of an angel in 1916 and six apparitions of the Blessed Virgin Mary in 1917 while tending sheep in the countryside of Fatima, Portugal. They were entrusted by Our Lady of Fatima with many messages and warnings for the world, and that they were to do penance and pray for the conversion of sinners.
Both became prayerful mystics, much wiser than their age, on account of these heavenly visits. The Blessed Mother told Francisco and Jacinta that they would die young. Francisco and Jacinta both contracted influenza in October 1918. After the siblings fell ill, Our Lady appeared to them again to inform them that she would come to take Francisco to heaven soon, and that Jacinta would follow not long after.
Intercessory Prayer:
Most Holy Trinity,
Father, Son, and Holy Spirit,
I adore You profoundly with all
the powers of my soul,
and I thank You for the apparitions
of the most Holy Virgin in Fatima
which have made manifest to the world the treasures
of her Immaculate Heart.
By the infinite merits of the Sacred Heart of Jesus
and through the intercession of the Immaculate Heart of Mary
I implore You, if it should be for Your greater glory and the good of
our souls to glorify in the sight of Your Holy Church Saint Jacinta
attaining for us, through her intercession, the grace we now implore…
(Mention your intention[s] here…)
Amen.
Say one "Our Father", one "Hail Mary", one "Glory be"
Our Lady of Fatima, Pray for us.
Saint Jacinta Marto, Pray for us.
Saint Francisco Marto
Background:
Francisco (1908-1919) and Jacinta (1910–1920) Marto were siblings and the youngest of the three shepherd children, who, along with their cousin, Lucia Santos, witnessed three apparitions of an angel in 1916 and six apparitions of the Blessed Virgin Mary in 1917 while tending sheep in the countryside of Fatima, Portugal. They were entrusted by Our Lady of Fatima with many messages and warnings for the world, and that they were to do penance and pray for the conversion of sinners.
Both became prayerful mystics, much wiser than their age, on account of these heavenly visits. The Blessed Mother told Francisco and Jacinta that they would die young. Francisco and Jacinta both contracted influenza in October 1918. After the siblings fell ill, Our Lady appeared to them again to inform them that she would come to take Francisco to heaven soon, and that Jacinta would follow not long after.
Intercessory Prayer:
Most Holy Trinity,
Father, Son, and Holy Spirit,
I adore You profoundly with all
the powers of my soul,
and I thank You for the apparitions
of the most Holy Virgin in Fatima
which have made manifest to the world the treasures
of her Immaculate Heart.
By the infinite merits of the Sacred Heart of Jesus
and through the intercession of the Immaculate Heart of Mary
I implore You, if it should be for Your greater glory and the good of
our souls to glorify in the sight of Your Holy Church Saint Francisco
attaining for us, through his intercession, the grace we now implore…
(Mention your intention[s] here…)
Amen.
Say one "Our Father", one "Hail Mary", one "Glory be"
Our Lady of Fatima, Pray for us.
Saint Francisco Marto, Pray for us.
Chair of St. Peter the Apostle
Background:
This feast commemorates the office of supreme pastor conferred by Christ upon St. Peter and continued in unbroken succession to the present. It celebrates the unity of the Church, which is founded upon the Apostle, and reinforces assent to the teaching office (Magisterium) of the Roman Pontiff, extending both to truths solemnly defined ex cathedra and to all acts of the ordinary Magisterium.
Intercessory Prayer:
Grant, we pray, almighty God
that no tempest may disturb us,
for you have set us fast
on the rock of the Apostle Peter's confession of faith.
Through our Lord Jesus Christ, your Son,
who lives and reigns with you in the unity of the Holy Spirit,
one God, for ever and ever.
Amen.