Holy Spirit Interactive Kids: A Saint a Day

St. Catherine of Alexandria

Feast Day: November 25
Born: (around) 285 :: Died: 305

Catherine lived in early Christian times and was the daughter of a wealthy pagan couple of Alexandria, Egypt. She was a very beautiful girl whose great interest was in learning. Catherine was very good at science and public speaking.

She loved to study deep questions of philosophy and religion. She began to read about Christianity. Then one day she received a vision and decided to become a Christian.

St. Catherine was only eighteen when Emperor Maxentius began making the Christians suffer. Without fear, lovely young Catherine told him that he was being very cruel and would be punished by God.

When he spoke of the pagan gods, she very plainly showed him that they were false. Maxentius could not answer her arguments, so he sent for fifty of his best pagan philosophers.

Once again, Catherine proved the truth of her religion. All fifty philosophers were convinced that she was right and decided to become Christians. In great anger, Maxentius had every one of them killed.

Then, he tried to win her by offering her a queen's crown. When Catherine refused the crown, he had her beaten and thrown into prison.

While Maxentius was away at camp, his wife and an officer were very curious to hear this amazing Christian girl speak and went to her prison cell. All who heard her knew she spoke the truth and as a result they and two hundred soldiers of the guard were converted and became Christians.

When Maxentius found out, they were all put to death. Then he ordered Catherine to be placed on a wheel full of spikes to be tortured to death. When the wheel began to spin, it suddenly snapped in two and broke.

Finally, St. Catherine was beheaded. She has always been the patroness of Christian philosophers.

Catholic Culture

Ordinary Time: November 25th

Optional Memorial of St. Catherine of Alexandria, virgin and martyr

MASS READINGS

November 25, 2017 (Readings on USCCB website)

COLLECT PRAYER

Almighty ever-living God, who gave Saint Catherine of Alexandria to your people as a Virgin and an invincible Martyr, grant that through her intercession we may be strengthened in faith and constancy and spend ourselves without reserve for the unity of the Church. Through our Lord Jesus Christ, your Son. who lives and reigns with you in the unity of the Holy Spirit, one God, for ever and ever.

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Activities (5)

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Prayers (6)

Old Calendar: St. Catherine of Alexandria, virgin and martyr ; Other Titles: St. Katherine

From time immemorial St. Catherine had been venerated at the monastery on Mount Sinai when, in the fifteenth century, the monks discovered her body. Legend has made of her a young Christian of Alexandria who rejected the advances of the Emperor Maximinus and routed a meeting of learned men gathered together to induce her to deny Christ. This feast was restored to the calendar in 2002.

St. Catherine of Alexandria
The account of her martyrdom is legendary and defies every attempt to cull out the historical kernel. Old Oriental sources make no mention of her. In the West her cult does not appear before the eleventh century, when the crusaders made it popular. She became the patroness of philosophical faculties; she is one of the "Fourteen Holy Helpers." The breviary offers the following:

Catherine, virgin of Alexandria, devoted herself to the pursuit of knowledge; at the age of eighteen, she surpassed all her contemporaries in science. Upon seeing how the Christians were being tortured, she went before Emperor Maximin (311-313), upbraided him for his cruelty, and with convincing reasons demonstrated the need of Christian faith in order to be saved. Astounded by her wisdom, the Emperor ordered her to be kept confined, and having summoned the most learned philosophers, promised them magnificent rewards if they could confound the virgin and turn her from belief in Christ. Far from being successful, a considerable number of the philosophers were inflamed by the sound reasons and persuasiveness of Catherine's speech with such a love for Jesus Christ that they declared themselves willing to offer their lives for the Gospel.

Then the Emperor attempted to win her by flattery and by promises, but his efforts proved equally fruitless. He ordered her whipped with rods, scourged with leaden nodules, and then left to languish eleven days without food in prison. The Emperor's wife and Porphyrius, general of the army, visited Catherine in prison; her words brought both to Christ and later they too proved their love in blood. Catherine's next torture consisted of being placed upon a wheel with sharp and pointed knives; from her lacerated body prayers ascended to heaven and the infernal machine fell to pieces. Many who witnessed the miracle embraced the faith. Finally, on November 25 Christ's servant was beheaded (307 or 312). By the hands of angels her body was carried to Mt. Sinai, where it was interred in the convent which bears her name.

Excerpted from The Church's Year of Grace, Pius Parsch.

Patron: Apologists; craftsmen who work with a wheel (potters; spinners; etc.); archivists; attorneys; barristers; dying people; educators; girls; jurists; knife grinders; knife sharpeners; lawyers; librarians; libraries; maidens; mechanics; millers; nurses; old maids; philosophers; potters; preachers; scholars; schoolchildren; scribes; secretaries; spinners; spinsters; stenographers; students; tanners; teachers; theologians; turners; unmarried girls; wheelwrights.

Symbols: Wheel set with sharp knives; broken wheel; sword; crown at her feet; hailstones; bridal veil and ring; dove; scourge; book; spiked wheel; woman strapped to the spiked wheel on which she was martyred; woman arguing with pagan philosophers.

Things to Do:

St. Catherine was invoked by young girls seeking husbands. If you have children, you could use this feast to discuss the qualities of a good spouse. You could bake St. Catherine's wigs and have your discussion as part of the fun (a spoon full of sugar).
Read more about St. Catherine.
St. Catherine's remains are in St. Katherine's Monastery on Mt. Sinai. The Monastery, a 1,600-year old fortress at the base of Mt. Sinai, is inhabited by Coptic monks (not in union with Rome). Inside the chapel is believed to be the Burning Bush, through which God first appeared to Moses. Read more about the history of the Church of Alexandria and the Council of Chalcedon where the Coptic Church broke from the bark of Peter and pray for the reunion of all Eastern Churches under the Pope.