St. Jerome and the Lion, by Brad Miner

By Brad Miner, The Catholic Thing, December 23, 2025

Brad Miner, husband and father, is Senior Editor of The Catholic Thing and a Senior Fellow of the Faith & Reason Institute. He is a former Literary Editor of National Review, and had a long career in the book publishing industry.

Then one of the elders said to me, “Do not weep. See, the Lion of the tribe of Judah, the Root of David, has conquered, so that he can open the scroll and its seven seals.”
– Revelation 5:5

There’s a story (likely a legend echoing the earlier Roman tale of Androcles and the lion) that one day in his study, St. Jerome (c. 342-420), hard at work translating the Holy Bible into Latin, had a visit from a lion. The lion had a splinter in its paw and begged the saint to remove it, which Jerome did, after which man and beast became inseparable.

Being a cat lover, I would very much like to have a lion as a friend, although not as a pet. I’ve seen videos of a South African “lion whisperer,” who raised some abandoned lion cubs and stayed friends with them over the years, so that when he walks out into the veld and calls for them, they come running and jump up to put their paws on his shoulders and lick his face. …

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