“Let your words teach and actions speak.”
-Feast Day of St. Anthony of Padua, June 13
Saint Anthony’s life, like ours, had its ups and downs – joys and pains. He worked hard at doing “the right thing” only to get knocked down. He responded with confident in God.
He was born in 1195 in Portugal to Martin and Mary Bulhom, who named him Fernando. at 15 he entered the St. Augustine Monastery. He wanted to dedicate his life to Christ with “proper formation” and master theology as an Augustinian. He remains in the order for 11 years.
One day while at the monastery the bodies of five Franciscans who had been tortured and beheaded in Morocco for preaching Christianity were carried back to Portugal for proper prayer and burial. That horrific sight motivated young Fernando to defend the faith and not just be a scholar of it.
He realized his longing – his hunger – was to bring souls to God even if it meant risking his life. He convinced the Augustinians to let him leave and the Franciscans to allow him to join their order and evangelize in Morocco for them. It was the Franciscans who gave him the name Anthony. He was engaging, inspiring, and ready to go far out into the world!
However, as most all of us can relate, Anthony’s plan was not God’s.
He left to be a missionary, but became very ill, and storms forced the ship he was on to go off course, landing in Sicily. They nursed him as best they could, but he remained too frail and lethargic to earn any meaningful assignment. He went into a life of seclusion and prayer.
No one knew his thoughtful intellect and ability to eloquently evangelize until he was the only one at an ordination celebration of Dominicans and Franciscans who was willing to give a short sermon.
Those in attendance were surprised and impressed by his fire, knowledge, and holiness.
Almost immediately he was assigned to preach in northern Italy. Once there he learned that in order to be heard it wasn’t how loud or intelligent he spoke, but how relatable he was. Even more so, how much he was willing to humble himself and not be arrogant and untouchable.
St. Anthony is quoted as saying, “The creator of the heavens obeys a carpenter, the God of eternal glory listens to a poor virgin. Has anyone ever witnessed anything comparable to this? Let the philosopher no longer disdain from listening to the common laborer; the wise, to the simple; the educated, to the illiterate; a child of a prince, to a peasant.”
He had to prove himself genuine, willing to live the gospel not just preach about it.
He didn’t set out to prove people wrong, but use his actions and words to share love and positivity.
In his early 30s he was sent to serve in Padua, where he preached to crowds large that he’d have to take his sermons outside the walls of the church or in an open field. People would camp out to hear him.
At 36 exhausted and not fully recovered from his earlier ailments, St. Anthony knew he was dying. Preaching in a town just outside Padua, he received his last anointing. It was during prayer with many friars gathered with him that he said, “I see my Lord!” He died peacefully soon after.
So many miracles were attributed to him during and after his life that he was declared a saint one year after his death by Pope Gregory IX.
