St. Gerard Majella: Feast Day, Patronage & Prayers
Updated: Oct 3
Feast day: October 16 (kept by the Redemptorists and in many places; not on the General Roman Calendar)
Patron of: Expectant mothers, childbirth, and unborn children.
About St. Gerard Majella
St. Gerard Majella was born in 1726 at Muro Lucano, in southern Italy, the son of a poor tailor who died when Gerard was twelve. He was apprenticed as a tailor and worked as a servant for a bishop known for his harshness, which Gerard bore cheerfully. He tried to join the Capuchins but was refused because of his poor health. In 1749 he joined the new Redemptorist congregation of St. Alphonsus Liguori as a lay brother, having left a note for his mother saying he had gone to become a saint.
Gerard served as tailor, gardener, porter, and sacristan, and he became known for his deep prayer, his obedience, and many wonders attributed to him. He once bore a false accusation of grave sin in silence until his accuser confessed the lie. Shortly before his death, he dropped a handkerchief at a family's home, and a girl kept it. Years later, in a dangerous labor, she asked for it and safely gave birth, and from such stories grew his patronage of mothers. He died of tuberculosis in 1755, at twenty-nine, and was canonized in 1904.
Prayers to St. Gerard Majella on Daily Catholic Prayers
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