Today’s Saint

By Franciscan Media - Brother André expressed a saint’s faith by a lifelong devotion to Saint Joseph... Sickness and weakness dogged André from birth. He was the eighth of 12 children born to a French Canadian couple near Montreal. Adopted at 12, when both parents had died, he became a farmhand. Various trades followed: shoemaker, baker, blacksmith—all failures. He was a factory worker in the United States during the boom times of the Civil War.

Franciscan Media - Perhaps because the United States got a later start in the history of the world, it has relatively few canonized saints, but their number is increasing... John Neumann was born in what is now the Czech Republic. After studying in Prague, he came to New York at 25 and was ordained a priest.

By Franciscan Media - Saint Elizabeth Ann Seton’s Story - Mother Seton is one of the keystones of the American Catholic Church. She founded the first American religious community for women, the Sisters of Charity. She opened the first American parish school and established the first American Catholic orphanage. All this she did in the span of 46 years while raising her five children.

By Franciscan Media - Jacomo or James, was born a noble member of the Benedetti family in the northern Italian city of Todi. He became a successful lawyer and married a pious, generous lady named Vanna... His young wife took it upon herself to do penance for the worldly excesses of her husband. One day Vanna, at the insistence of Jacomo, attended a public tournament.