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Yes, I am a Catholic. Yes, I have a sense of humour. These are all true, though. Just because they were saints didn’t make their lives any easier than yours or mine. Usually it made things quite a bit more difficult :)

Headline 1: “When in 1576 the Discalced Friars convened their own Chapter, the Calced moved to carry out the prohibitions of 1575. They arrested John and another friar and imprisoned him in a Calced monastery in Toledo in a windowless 6’ x 10’ room. Scourged and humiliated, he nonetheless refused to renounce the Reform. He passed the time in his cell composing the sublime lyric poems which form the basis of his mystical treatises.” http://www.carmelite.com/saints/john/b1.shtml

Headline 2: “St Joan stands alone in history. Many women have found sanctity in the cloister, some have shown bravery in battle, but no other ever trained herself to holiness in a soldier’s camp, and surely no female saint ever died at the stake condemned by an ecclesiastical tribunal as a witch and a heretic.” http://www.ewtn.com/library/MARY/JOAN1.HTM

Headline 3: “While Louis preached a sermon against the sin of intemperance, drunkards from the tavern near the church could be heard, mocking him in loud and vulgar shouts and songs. When he finished his sermon he went straight to the tavern to give them a severe tongue-lashing. Seeing words were not enough, he knocked over the tables and went to work with fists. All scrambled out somehow, and he warned, “Don’t come back, it will be all the worse for you if you do.” Every time he preached, thereafter, in the awakened town of Roussay, he found a most respectful and attentive congregation.” http://www.angelusonline.org/print.php?sid=809

Headline 4: “Young Vianney was drawn in the conscription, the war with Spain and the urgent need of recruits having caused Napoleon to withdraw the exemption enjoyed by the ecclesiastical students in the diocese of his uncle, Cardinal Fesch. Matthieu Vianney tried unsuccessfully to procure a substitute, so his son was obliged to go. His regiment soon received marching orders. The morning of departure, Jean-Baptiste went to church to pray, and on his return to the barracks found that his comrades had already left. He was threatened with arrest, but the recruiting captain believed his story and sent him after the troops. At nightfall he met a young man who volunteered to guide him to his fellow-soldiers, but led him to Noes, where some deserters had gathered. The mayor persuaded him to remain there, under an assumed name, as schoolmaster. After fourteen months, he was able to communicate with his family. His father was vexed to know that he was a deserter and ordered him to surrender but the matter was settled by his younger brother offering to serve in his stead and being accepted.” http://www.newadvent.org/cathen/08326c.htm

Headline 5: “As a beloved Son who imitated his father’s habits of idolatry, Augustine took up residence in the sin of fornication. He and his mistress begot a son out of wedlock. Promoting the widespread heresy of Manichæanism, Augustine renounced his Catholic faith....[St.]Monica was responsible for the conversion of Augustine’s mistress who later entered a convent for the rest of her life.” http://www.catholic.org/featured/sheen.php?ID=1225