Saints

Foundress of the reformed (Discalced) Carmelites. Teresa was born in 1515 to an aristocratic family in Avila. As a child she showed precocious piety by playing at hermitages with her younger brother. The pair once ran away from home, hoping to go to Morocco and die as martyrs. After her mother's death when she was just 14, Teresa went through a spell of being very interested in boys and clothes.... Read More

St Callistus Pope and martyr. This early Pope was born a slave, served sentence as a convict, was the champion of forgiveness and died for his Christian faith. Callistus was a slave owned by a Roman Christian called Carpophorus. He was put in charge of a bank, but somehow lost the money deposited by other Christians. He fled from Rome but was captured at Porto, and sentenced to work on a treadmi... Read More

St Gerard Majella Lay brother. Born in 1725, in Basilica, Italy, Gerard trained and worked in his father's trade as a tailor before joining the Redemptorist noviciate at Deliceto, in 1749. St Alphonsus Liguori recognised his extraordinary spirituality and ordered that he be professed early. Although he worked in ordinary jobs, as a porter and a gardener, his life was marked by a series of extraord... Read More