St. Blaise and the Fourteen Holy Helpers

Introduction

The Fourteen Holy Helpers are a group of saints whose intercession is known to be very effective - especially against ailments and many various diseases. They were heavily invoked when a serious plague struck Europe. The devotion to the Fourteen Holy Helpers began in the Rhineland and spread to the areas around it. Their feast as a group is celebrated traditionally on August 8. When, however, the new Vatican II teaching on devotion to the saints, pulled out from its roster of saints, those saints who have no historical records, it excluded some saints in these Fourteen Holy Helpers. However, Church tradition continues to honor these saints according to their individual feast days.

The Fourteen Holy Helpers are as follows:

• St. Blaise, d. ca. 316 A.D.. feast February 3. Born of wealthy Christian parents, he became a bishop at a young age. As bishop of Sebastea, Armenia, during the persecution of Christians by Licinius, St. Blaise was tortured and beheaded.


• St. Acacius, also Agathus, Agathius - d. ca. 303 A.D., feast May 8. A Cappadocian by birth, he became a centurion, and was arrested for his Christian faith. He was tortured, scourged and beheaded.


• St. Barbara, 4th century, feast December 4. She resisted her pagan father's demands that she marry. Her father handed her over to the judge, who had her tortured. Because of her continued resistance, her father took her up a mountain and killed her. (Her father afterwards was destroyed by fire from heaven).


• St. Catherine of Alexandria, d. ca. 310 A.D., feast November 25. She was born in Alexandria to a patrician family and was converted to Christianity by a vision. Her spiritual influence on others was so great that the Emperor offered a bribe of royal marriage, if she would apostasize. She naturally resisted the bribe but was put in prison. She was condemned to death on a spiked wheel. When the wheel miraculously broke, she was then beheaded.


• St. Christopher, d. ca. 251 A.D., feast July 25. Legends say that he made a living by carrying people across a river. One day, one of his passengers was a small child. As they crossed the river, the child grew heavier. When St. Christopher feared that both of them would drown, the child then revealed to him that he was Jesus, and the heaviness was due to the weight of the world on his shoulders. St. Christopher then became true to his name, which means "Christ-bearer". He died at Lycia, probably in one of the Christian persecutions by the Roman Emperor.


• St. Cyriacus, also Cyriac, Ciriacus, d. ca. 304 A.D., feast August 8. He was known to be a deacon, who cured the Emperor's daughter from possession, and also did the same for the daughter of the King of Persia. However, when he returned to Rome, he was arrested together with his two companions. They were all tortured and beheaded.


• St. Denis, also Dionysius, d. ca. 258 A.D., feast October 9. He was born in Italy and was sent, together with others, to Gaul as a missionary. He became the first bishop of Paris. Because he was very effective in converting the residents around Paris, he was arrested together with his companion priest, St. Rusticus, and his deacon, St. Eleutherius. The three of them were imprisoned, beheaded, and their bodies thrown into the Seine River.


• St. Erasmus, also Elmo, d. ca. 303 A.D., feast June 2. He was a bishop of Formiae, Campagna, Italy, whose success with converting pagans to Christians, brought him before the Emperor, who had him tortured. Because of the many wounds that were inflicted on him, he eventually died as a martyr.


• St. Eustace, d. ca. 118 A.D., feast September 20. Originally a pagan Roman general, he was converted to Christianity while in a hunting trip. In that hunt, he saw a stag with the figure of Christ on the cross between its antlers. Still in the Roman army, he then won a great victory. When in the celebration, he refused to sacrifice to the Roman gods, he and his family were all roasted to death.


• St. George, d. ca. 303 A.D., feast April 19. He was probably a soldier in the imperial army. Legend tells us that he is a Christian knight who came to Libya, where a dragon was terrorizing a city. As St. George tried to subdue the dragon, it went into the city. St. George slew the dragon, after the inhabitants of the city agreed to be baptized.


• St. Margaret of Antioch, no date, feast July 20. She was a daughter of a pagan priest at Antioch in Pisidia. When she was converted to Christianity, her father drove her out of the house. She became a shepherdess, and because of her beauty, Olybrius the prefect, made advances towards her. When she resisted, he charged her for being a Christian. He had her tortured and put in prison. Attempts were made to execute her by fire and then by drowning, but she was miraculously saved. Eventually, the executioners decided to behead her.


• St. Pantaleon, also Pantaleimon, ca. 305, feast July 27. He was the son of a pagan father, but raised as a Christian by his mother. He became a physician in the Emperor's court and soon lost his faith by a dissolute life. After converting from his dissolute life, when the persecution of Christians was ordered by Diocletian, he was denounced as a Christian by his fellow physicians. Together with others, he was arrested, condemned to death, and beheaded.


• St. Vitus, d. ca. 300 A.D., feast June 15. He was a son of a senator and became a Christian when he was twelve. He caused many conversions and performed many miracles. When this became known to the administrator of Sicily (Valerian), the administrator wanted to shake the faith of St. Vitus. Valerian was not able to shake the faith of Vitus, and Vitus afterwards decided to flee to Luconia, and then to Rome. When one of his miraculous cures was attributed by the imperial court to sorcery, he was subjected to various tortures until he eventually died from the wounds inflicted upon him.


• St. Giles, ca. 712 A.D., feast September 1. Of all the Fourteen Holy Helpers, only St. Giles did not die as a martyr for the faith. St. Giles was an Athenian who escaped to Marseilles after much adulation was showered on him for a miracle he performed. He became a hermit at the mouth of the Rhone River. After the Gothic King Flavius witnessed the sanctity and holiness of St. Giles, the King built a monastery with St. Giles as abbot. He attracted many disciples and his reputation reached far and wide.