Today is Nov. 25, optional memorial of St. Catherine of Alexandria, virgin and martyr.
Today, as we observe the feast of St. Catherine of Alexandria, we hear at Mass these verses from the Book of Revelation: “These are the ones who follow the Lamb wherever he goes. They have been ransomed as the first fruits of the human race for God and the Lamb. On their lips no deceit has been found; they are unblemished” (Rv 14:4-5).
St. Catherine, a young woman of great intellect and faith, followed Christ, the Lamb of God, with an undivided heart. Roman Egypt — the society into which she was born — valued power, prestige and earthly knowledge. And in that same society, Catherine was unafraid to speak the truth of the Gospel. Her wisdom confounded the scholars of her day. According to tradition, Catherine converted hundreds, possibly thousands of hearers.
Her lips, like those described in the verse from Revelation, were without deceit. She reminds us that to follow the Lamb wherever he goes is to embrace both the joy and the cost of discipleship. It is to follow him in the quiet moments of contemplation and study, as well as in the moments of courage when we stand for the Faith, even in the face of rejection and suffering.
Devotion to St. Catherine peaked in the Middle Ages when she was included in the list of the 14 Holy Helpers, that is, heaven’s “most effective” intercessors. Catherine was to be martyred on a wheel, but when the moment came to affix her to the cruel device, the wheel shattered. She was then beheaded. St. Catherine thus became patroness of any medieval profession that used a wheel. Potters, rope-makers, wheelwrights and seamstresses all claim her as patron. But given her intellectual prowess and virginity, so, too, do unmarried women, students, philosophers and lawyers.
In honoring St. Catherine, we pray for her intercession that we, too, might speak the truth with courage, remain unblemished in our commitment to Christ, and follow him wherever he leads us. Like her, may we offer our lives as “first fruits” for God and live with unwavering devotion to the Lamb who has ransomed us by his love.
Let us ask for St. Catherine’s intercession:
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, God, for ever and ever.
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