Saints of the Week: Our Lady, Remi, Hilary, Macrina, Gregory of Nyssa, Kentigern, Nino, Popes, & More

Happy Sunday! Winter can seem dark and dreary, but we should keep the light of Christ alive in our hearts, as the saints we celebrated this week did.

Jan. 13 was the feast of Jesus’s Baptism in the Latin Mass calendar, commemorating the Gospel event that marked both Jesus’s institution of the sacrament of Baptism and a revelation of the Trinity (see Mark 1, Matt. 3).

Our Lady of Prompt Succor (Jan. 8) is a title under which Mary is honored in connection with a statue brought from France to the US by a grateful Ursuline sister in thanks for an answered prayer. The statue was enshrined in the Ursuline convent in New Orleans, and prayer before it to Our Lady of Prompt Succor saved the convent from fire and later helped Andrew Jackson’s soldiers to a great victory over a superior British force during the War of 1812.

St. Remigius of Rheims or Remi (Jan. 13): “Born to the Gallo-Roman nobility, the son of Emilius, count of Laon, and of Saint Celina; younger brother of Saint Principius of Soissons; uncle of Saint Lupus of Soissons. A speaker noted for his eloquence, he was selected bishop of Rheims (in modern France) at age 22 while still a layman, and served his diocese for 74 years. He evangelized throughout Gaul, working with Saint Vaast. Spiritual teacher of Saint Theodoric. Converted Clovis, king of the Franks, baptising him on 24 December 496; this opened the way to the conversion of all the Franks and the establishment of the Church throughout France. Blind at the time of his death [in 533].”

St. Hilary of Poitiers (Jan. 13/14) was a pagan nobleman, husband, and father who converted after reading the Bible. After becoming bishop of Poitiers, France, in 353, he opposed imperial meddling in Church affairs and was exiled, though he later returned. His writings converted many pagans, gaining him fame, and leading to his being declared a Doctor of the Church in modern times. Hilary also fought the heresy of Arianism.

St. Macrina the Elder (Jan. 14): “Grandmother of Saint Basil the Great, Saint Gregory of Nyssa, Saint Peter of Sebaste, and Saint Macrina the Younger, and apparently raised Basil. Spiritual student of Saint Gregory Thaumaturgus. She and her husband lived in hiding in a forest at Pontus for seven years during the persecutions of Diocletian, nearly starving several times. Widowed.”

St. Gregory of Nyssa (Jan. 10, Byzantine calendar) was a friend and relative of saints, a married professor of rhetoric. He became a hermit, then a bishop, then an archbishop, always fighting Arianism. Cheated by the dishonest and accused of their wrongdoing, he was deposed and exiled, but returned to his see to attend Church councils and fight the heresy of Meletianism. A Father of the Church, he was referred to as the “Father of the Fathers” for his defense of the true faith. He is said to be the first Church leader to condemn slavery.

St. Kentigern (Jan. 13) was a Scottish monk and bishop exiled by pagans.

St. Nino of Georgia (Jan. 14) was not native to but was enslaved in the country of Georgia, which she evangelized.

Pope St. Hyginus (Jan. 11) was a 2nd century Greek, who, as pontiff, opposed the heresy of Gnosticism.

Bl. Nicholas Bunkerd Kitbamrung was a Thai priest who served as a missionary in Vietnam.

Read about many more inspiring saints at my Substack!