St. Agatha of Catania
(A.D. 250/1)
Born at Palermo or Catania,
Sicily; died at Catania, Sicily, c. 250/1. There certainly was a
martyr named Agatha at Catania, who was venerated there from
very early times as demonstrated by her inclusion in Saint
Jerome's Martyrology, the calendar of Carthage (c. 530),
the Syriac calendar, and the canon of the Roman Mass, but
nothing else is known of her. There are many versions of the
basic legend included here.
Agatha must have been beautiful
and wealthy for the Sicilian consul Quintinian tried to force
her to become his wife. When she refused because she had already
dedicated herself to God as a virgin, he turned against her and
decided to punish her by installing the pure girl in a brothel
for a month. She resisted all attempts to shame her.
When this didn't work, Quintinian, who did not believe in
God, brought her before the courts on the charge of
belonging to the outlawed Christian sect. The accounts of
her tortures are frightful--racked, scourged, branded. Even
her breasts were cut off, and she was allowed no medicines
or bandages or food when she was sent to a dark dungeon. It
is said that Saint Peter appeared to her in a vision
accompanied by a youth carrying a torch. He applied ointment
and healed her wounds. Four days later, unmoved my the
miraculous cure of her wounds, Quintinian caused her to be
rolled naked over live coals mixed with potsherds.
Agatha
would pray passionately throughout all this: "Lord Jesus
Christ: you know what is in my heart and mind. Take me and
all that I am and make me Your own." Naturally Agatha
believed that death would be a happy release from her
torturers into the arms of Jesus. They carried her broken
body back to her prison, while she prayed for release. At
that moment, just after an earthquake, Agatha died in prison
of her injuries.
A saint
who bore such trials was greatly revered, and her tomb
became a sacred spot for Christians. Saint Gregory the
Great, for example, took a church which the Goths used in
Rome, and re-consecrated it to the saint. The church of Sant
Agata dei Goti still stands, preserving the memory of this
virgin martyr.
Her
intercession as patron of Malta is credited with preserving
the island from the Turks in 1551. Her prayers were also
efficacious in preventing the eruption of Mt. Etna on
several occasions. Its torrent of burning sulphur and stones
was averted from the walls of Catania several times by the
silken veil of Saint Agatha (taken from her tomb), fixed on
a lance, and carried in procession. As the sacred relic met
the lava, the flow would stop and the eruption end.
Her name
is found in the litany of the saints and in all
martyrologies: Syriac, Greek and Latin (Attwater,
Benedictines, Bentley, Delaney, Encyclopedia, Farmer,
Husenbeth, White).
Agatha is
the patroness of Catania, where she preserves Mt. Etna from
erupting. She is also patroness of bell-founders (shaped
like her breasts, or possibly because bells are used to warn
of fire), firefighters, girdlers, jewelers, maltsters,
nurses, wet-nurses, weavers, and shepherdesses. Agatha is
invoked against earthquake, fire, lightning, storm,
sterility, wolves, and diseases of the breast (Roeder,
White).
