Patron Saints: Trades Division Quiz

Answer: Fishermen

It seems fitting that St. Andrew should be the patron saint of fishermen. (I never can get my head around the pc term fisherpeople). In his lifetime, Andrew was a Galilean fishermen. He became a disciple of John the Baptist, and after John's death he responded to Jesus' call to follow Him.

It was Andrew who persuaded his brother Peter to leave everything behind to follow Jesus. Tradition has it that after the first Pentecost, Andrew preached the gospel in Greece and in Turkey (he is supposed to have founded the first church in Constantinople, but there is no historic basis for this claim). Patras in Achaia (near Corinth) is reputedly the site of Andrew's crucifixion on an x-shaped cross.

The legend of St. Andrew says that even while he was on the cross, Andrew preached for two days before he eventually died.

Answer: Crispin and Crispinian

Justus and Justinian were not brothers. Justus was one of the missionaries who was sent to Canterbury in 601 by Pope Gregory II to provide reinforcement for St. Augustine of Canterbury, and Justinian was a sixth century hermit who lived on an island off the coast of Wales. The Apostles James and John were brothers, the sons of Zebedee, but they have other patronage responsibilities. There are two saints named Martin - one was a bishop, the other a pope, and Martinus exists only in my imagination and was, therefore, brother to neither of them. Which leaves Crispin and Crispinian as the correct answer. Little is known of these two - some claim that they were born in France, others maintain they were noble Roman brothers. They seem to have been missionaries to Gaul, where they supported themselves by working as shoemakers in order not to be dependent on the charity of the people. They were martyred in Soissons (according to tradition) around the year 285.

There was a shrine to Crispin and Crispinian in Faversham, England, whence it is claimed they had fled during the persecutions in Gaul. They were supposed to have plied their shoemaking trade in a house where the Swan Inn now stands, and it was the site of pilgrimage up to the 17th century. Crispin and Crispinian were certainly well-known in England, and Crispin at any rate gets a mention in one of Henry's stirring speeches in Shakespeare's 'Henry V'. The battle of Agincourt was fought on the saints' feast day, October 25, in 1415.

Answer: Luke

Luke the Physician is not only the patron saint of doctors and artists, but also the patron of butchers. I sincerely hope this is not a reflection on his surgical skills.

Luke was a Greek by birth and a convert to Christianity. He accompanied St. Paul on missionary journeys into Asia Minor and Greece, and is also the author of the Gospel that bears his name and the Book of the Acts of the Apostles.

Luke is unusual among the early apostles and evangelists in that he was not martyred but is reputed to have lived to the ripe old age of 84 (very ripe for the first century) and died in Bithynia in Asia Minor. There is an ancient (and unproved) legend that he founded a church in Constantinople.

Answer: Arnulf of Soissons

Arnulf of Soissons was a soldier before he became a monk at the monastery of St. Menard in Soissons, which is in Picardy, about 60 miles northeast of Paris. He lived there as a hermit until his fellow-monks chose him as their abbot. Since most monasteries were self-sustaining, maybe Arnulf's monastery provided milling services for local farmers and that's how Arnulf got his patronage appointment. In 1081 he was elected Bishop of Soissons but an anti-Arnulf faction prevented him from carrying out his episcopal duties, so he said to heck with it (or the eleventh century equivalent thereof) and took himself off to Aldenburg in what used to be called Flanders and founded a monastery there. He died in 1087.

Anselm of Canterbury is chiefly known for writing 'The Proslogion', a treatise in which he gives ontological proof for the existence of God. Waldef fought against William the Conqueror at the Battle of Hastings, was pardoned by William, later fell out of favour, and ended up being a symbol of Anglo-Saxon resistance to Norman rule. He was beheaded in 1076 and buried at the Abbey of Croyland, a foundation which he had supported financially. Wulsin was the first abbot of Westminster and he died in 1002.

Answer: Goldsmiths

St. Dunstan was appointed abbot of Glastonbury in 939 and is credited with restoring the monasteries in England which had been decimated by the invading Vikings. He re-established the Benedictine Rule which flourished from his day until the dissolution of the monasteries during the reign of Henry VIII.

In 960, Dunstan became Archbishop of Canterbury and was zealous in carrying out his episcopal duties, reforming the laxity of both monastic and church life throughout England. In his spare time, Dunstan was an accomplished metalworker and it is probably for this reason that he is the patron saint of goldsmiths and jewellers.

Answer: Catherine of Alexandria

There is no reason to suppose that Catherine of Alexandria ever really existed. She was purported to be a young Christian virgin (weren't they all?) who lived in Alexandria in Egypt in the early part of the fourth century. There is no actual record of such a person and no mention of her prior to the ninth century, some five hundred years after her alleged martyrdom. It seems that she protested the persecution of Christians under the emperor Maxentius and at her trial she was set the task of defending Christianity against the dissenting arguments of fifty court philosophers. Catherine supposedly came out on top, so, in what would seem to be the original "damned if you do and damned if you don't" kind of situation, she was sentenced to death by being bound to a large wheel and rolled down a hill. The wheel broke and the flying debris caused injury to several bystanders and killed others. Catherine, who survived the ordeal, was beheaded. Nowadays, when we hear reference to a Catherine Wheel, we think of fireworks. Maybe the fireworks got their name because the flaming sparks reminded someone of the original Catherine Wheel breaking apart and flying into the crowds gathered to watch Catherine die.

Mary of Egypt is another saint of whom there is no historical record. According to the legend, she was an illiterate Egyptian prostitute who heard about Christianity and decided to go on a pilgrimage to Jerusalem. While there, she had a vision in which God instructed her to go into the desert on the other side of the Jordan. She took three loaves and set out to become, I suppose, a Desert Mother. She lived there as a hermit for the rest of her long life, subsisting on berries and dates. Her clothes had disintegrated and she was clad only in her very long hair until God sent a monk, Zosimus, to baptize her and he gave her his cloak. He agreed to return to give her Holy Communion on Maundy Thursday but when he arrived he found her dead. According to the legend, a lion helped the monk to bury her, and you can believe that if you like.

Theresa of Avila (1515-82) was a Spanish aristocrat who became a Carmelite nun. She eventually founded the Order of the Discalced (Reformed) Carmelites, and was a great friend of St. John of the Cross, with whom she corresponded over many years.

Margaret of Scotland (1046-93) was one of the last remaining members of the Anglo-Saxon royal house. Following the Norman conquest of England, she fled to Scotland and came to the attention of King Malcolm III who was attracted by her beauty and piety. They married in 1069 and their marriage was both happy and fruitful (eight children). Two of her sons - Alexander and David - succeeded to the throne of Scotland and her daughter Matilda married Henry I of England. She was lavish in her almsgiving and devoted her spare time to embroidering ecclesiastical linens, reading devotional works and prayer.

Answer: Bus drivers

Why St. Michael the Archangel gets to keep an eye on public transport workers is beyond me. Indeed, I'm not even sure why an Archangel rates sainthood in the first place. Had I been in charge of assigning St. Michael his patronage duties, I'd have put him on to keep watch over swordsmiths and armourers since he is the Archangel usually depicted with a sword (tradition has it that he was the angel with the flaming sword whom God posted at the gates of Eden to prevent Adam and Eve from sneaking back in).

The Book of Daniel describes Michael as the commander of the forces battling against Satan. He's also shown in art as slaying dragons, which are symbols of Satan. I attended the Convent School of St. Michael and All Angels when I was a child, and we looked forward to our saint's feast day, September 29, because we got the day off!

Answer: Laurence

St. Laurence, also known as St. Laurence of the Gridiron, was a deacon in third-century Rome, charged with distributing alms to the poor. He was a close friend of Pope Sixtus II who was martyred a few days before Laurence in 258CE. Very few details of Laurence's life are historical, up to and including the manner of his death. Legend has it that he was roasted to death on a gridiron (no, American football fans, we're not talking about a football field here but an early form of the barbecue). This is highly unlikely, since doing away with Christians at that time in Rome was usually accomplished either by beheading or running them through with a sword. The story goes that Laurence met his death cheerfully, even telling his executioners to turn him over, saying "I'm done on this side."

St. Thomas More was beheaded in 1535 after refusing to acknowledge King Henry VIII as the Supreme Head of the Church in England.

Apollonia was an elderly deaconess in Alexandria who was martyred in 249CE. She was tortured - all her teeth were broken and pulled out and her jaw was broken - and then condemned to be burned alive because she would not recant. It is said that rather than waiting to be thrown onto the bonfire prepared for her she willingly jumped into the flames.

St. Jean Brebeuf was a French Jesuit priest who worked among the Huron people in Canada for 27 years. He is credited with writing the beautiful 'Huron Carol', a favourite Canadian Christmas carol which uses images for the nativity that would make sense to the Huron people, with Jesus being born in a lodge made of broken bark "in the moon of winter time, when all the geese had fled", and wrapped in a rabbit skin, with hunters taking the place of the shepherds and chiefs from other tribes replacing the three wise men). In 1649 Brebeuf was captured by the Iroquois, the chief enemies of the Huron. He was flayed alive and then burned at the stake, along with his colleague Fr. Georges Lalemant. St. Jean Brebeuf is the patron saint of Canada.

Answer: Eligius

St. Eligius (aka Eloi or Loy) lived circa 588-660. He was a goldsmith at the court of the Merovingian king Clotar I. He got his job not only because he was a superb craftsman but because he was never known to waste even a milligram of his precious material. Indeed, Clotar was so impressed that Eligius had been able to fashion two gold thrones using the gold that had been allotted for only one that he hired him on the spot and set him to work making chalices and patens, crosses and other ecclesiatical plate and accoutrements. Perhaps it was creating all those beautiful things to adorn churches that prompted Eligius to take Holy Orders. He became a priest and later a Bishop. He is credited with being the primary apostle to the Flemish people.

St. Genesius is the patron saint of comedians, St. Boniface is the patron saint of brewers, and Hildegard is not a saint but she has been beatified, so when she makes it to saint, she'll probably end up being the patron of New Agers who have adopted her as one of their own (which would have scandalized the very orthodox abbess!)

Answer: Barbara

Christopher is the patron saint of porters and travellers (travellers also have St. Peregrine keeping an eye on them, probably because in the days when the patronages were handed out travel was a dangerous enterprise by land or sea). Catherine of Alexandria, as you found out earlier in this quiz, is the patron saint of mechanics, while Elizabeth of Hungary is charged with being the patron saint of bakers, brides, countesses, dying children, exiles, the homeless, hospitals, lacemakers, nurses, tertiaries and widows, so she's far too busy to take on miners!

Barbara, on the other hand, is the patron saint of all those who have jobs that carry the risk of sudden and/or violent death - gunners, military engineers, and miners, along with masons and stonecutters (who might fall off buildings and die suddenly and violently, I suppose) and mathematicians (although I should imagine that to be a fairly safe occupation, free of risk.) Barbara is also invoked against lightning, based on the legend that her father, ticked off because she wouldn't marry the man of his choice because she had dedicated her virginity to God, turned her in to the Roman authorities who condemned her to death. Dad suffered divine retribution, we're told, and was struck by lightning and killed. I have a sneaking suspicion that Barbara was removed from the Calendar of Saints because there is no proof that she ever really existed.