Saint Paul the Hermit
DATE: 15th January
Our Catholic Saints are well known for their faith, their following of God’s will throughout their life and their prayer life. We have Saints whom are patrons and protectors against certain things within our worlds, such as fires, families, rain, job searching etc. But did you know that we have a protector for the “makers of mats.” Although this sounds like a simple job, I feel that it is wonderful that our Church is so diverse that even seemingly small, insignificant things such as making mats, can have a special protector and intercessor on our behalf. Saint Paul the Hermit is this Saint.
Saint Paul’s journey began in Thebes where he was born, growing up in Egypt. At one stage in his life he fled persecutions under the emperor, due to his faith. He spread through the desert, preaching and living out his Christian faith as he went. He gathered the name ‘Hermit’, as he was the first Christian ‘hermit’ whom roamed without a home, in a gypsy or nomadic way, living out his faith.
Everyone may not be called to be a ‘hermit’ as such and live a nomadic life like Saint Paul. Although we can be more nomadic in whom we speak to about Christ, we could try to be more approachable and ask the Holy Spirit to give us words of wisdom to speak to others about our faith in humility, oppose to boasting or ‘bible bashing’ as some call it.
By observing Saint Paul’s life, we can see that to be a Saint, we don’t have to do extraordinary miracles or works of God, but we can do simple and humble works and follow His will for our lives.
So lets try to be saints within our own lives, within our daily task, at our mothers groups, morning tea, at work, morning routines with our children, sending our husband off to work with his lunch, cleaning clothes (and folding them away!) or even as we clean those mountains of dishes. Sometimes we may feel as though we are not doing enough. What we can do is work on doing those small tasks really well and offer up every part of our day to the Lord.
Originally posted 2014-01-15 07:07:37.