Saints

Archbishop. Born in 347, the son of an army officer at Antioch, St John was brought up by his widowed mother. In 373 he went to live as a monk in a mountain community and became quite ill because of the austere regime there. In 381 he returned to Antioch and became a deacon serving the local church, until he was ordained priest in 407. He was soon made the bishop's assistant and was responsible... Read More

Layman. Guy was a farm labourer, born in Brabant around 950, who was made sacristan of the church at Laeken near Brussels. According to legend, he invested his small savings in a business which failed. After losing his home and his job he went on a seven-year long pilgrimage, wandering from shrine to shrine as far as Jerusalem. In 1020 he returned home exhausted and sick and died shortly afterwa... Read More

Notburga was an Austrian laywoman from what is now called the Tyrol. She was born around 1250 to a poor peasant family. At the age of 18 she was employed as a kitchen maid in the castle of Count Henry of Rattenberg. The family squandered more food on pig-swill than Notburga's parents ate in weeks. She saved all the leftovers from the Count's family table and gave them to the poor. Count Henry's wi... Read More