Portal:Catholicism/Patron Archive/November 3
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Saint Martín de Porres (December 9, 1579--November 3, 1639) was a Dominican friar who was beatified in 1837 by Pope Gregory XVI and canonized on May 6, 1962 by Pope John XXIII.
Martin was born in Lima, Peru, as the illegitimate son of a Spanish nobleman and a young freed slave woman, possibly Afro-Peruvian, born in Panama. He grew up in poverty, and at the age of 11 was taken in by the Dominicans as a servant boy. As his duties grew he was promoted to almoner, and then put in charge of the infirmary. His piety and miraculous cures led his superiors to drop the racial limits on admission to the Order and he was made a full Dominican brother. It is said that when his priory was in debt, he implored them: "I am only a poor mulatto, sell me. I am the property of the order, sell me please!" Martin was deeply attached to the Blessed Sacrament, and according to a biography of him, he was praying in front of it one night when the step of the altar he was kneeling on caught fire. However, the story goes, throughout all the confusion and chaos that followed, he remained where he was, unaware of what was happening around him.
His work on behalf of the poor was tireless: he established an orphanage and a children's hospital. He maintained an austere lifestyle, which included fasting and forswearing meat. His devotion to prayer was notable even by the pious standards of the age. Among the many miracles attributed to him were those of levitation, bilocation, miraculous knowledge, instantaneous cures and an ability to communicate with animals.
One day an aged beggar, covered with ulcers and almost naked, stretched out his hand, and Saint Martin, seeing the Divine Mendicant in him, took him to his own bed, paying no heed to the fact that he was not perfectly neat and clean. One of his brethren, considering he had gone too far in his charity, reproved him. Saint Martin replied: “Compassion, my dear Brother, is preferable to cleanliness. Reflect that with a little soap I can easily clean my bed covers, but even with a torrent of tears I would never wash from my soul the stain that my harshness toward the unfortunate would create.”
Martin was a friend of St. John de Massias and Saint Rose of Lima. He died in Lima in 1639. As his body was displayed to allow the people of the city to pay their respects, each person snipped a tiny piece of his habit to keep as a relic.
Attributes: a dog, a cat, a bird, and a mouse eating together from a same dish; broom, crucifix, rosary
Patronage: diocese of Biloxi, Mississippi, black people, hair stylists, innkeepers, mixed-race people, Peru, poor people, public education, public health, public schools, race relations, social justice, state schools, television
Prayer:
