St. Lucy: Feast Day, Patronage & Prayers
Feast day: December 13 (Memorial of St. Lucy, Virgin and Martyr)
Patron of: The blind and those with eye trouble; Syracuse.
About St. Lucy
St. Lucy was a young Christian woman of Syracuse in Sicily who died as a martyr during the persecution of Diocletian, around the year 304. Her name, from the Latin word for light, and her early and widespread veneration show how deeply the Church loved her. She is named in the Roman Canon of the Mass, and an inscription found in the catacombs of Syracuse already honored her by the early fifth century.
According to her traditional story, Lucy made a pilgrimage with her ailing mother to the tomb of St. Agatha at Catania, where her mother was healed. Lucy then asked to give her dowry to the poor and to live for Christ alone. The man to whom she had been promised in marriage denounced her as a Christian. Tradition holds that the authorities could not move her even with a team of oxen, and that she was finally killed by the sword. Because of her name, she became the patron of the blind and of eyesight. Her feast, on December 13, falls in the darkest part of the year and is celebrated with candles in Sweden and elsewhere, a sign of Christ's light.
Prayers to St. Lucy on Daily Catholic Prayers
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