St. Walburga, Pray for Me!

Last year, I went on Jennifer Fulwiler's Conversion Diary blog and used her Saints Name Generator to have it choose a special patron for me for 2013.  I got miracle-worker and stigmatist St. Padre Pio, a great and well-known saint of the modern era.  He was randomly chosen for me--and then amazingly, it seemed that he was sending me little messages throughout the year.  We routinely receive stacks of mailings from different Catholic groups and charities, this is true; but believe me when I tell you that we got way more Padre Pio-inspired goodies in the mail than I could ever remember getting before the year 2013.  We got prayer cards, packets of healing oil from the Padre Pio shrine, Rosary rings with relics embedded...it was eerie how often this saint appeared in our mailbox, reminding me to pray extra hard to him for all of my various intentions.

Yesterday, I saw that the new Saints Name Generator for 2014 was up, so I thanked Padre Pio for his love and protection in 2013 and gave the wheel another spin.  This year, my special patron saint is St. Walburga, who is obviously a lot less well-known than my 2013 patron.  Born in England, St. Walburga is the daughter of St. Richard the King.  She became a nun, and then an abbess, and in the 8th century, she evangelized and healed pagans in what is now Germany.  Although I knew the story of King Richard, the Crusader who became a canonized saint, I'd never heard a single thing about his daughter Walburga (and my first thought was that, as I've mentioned before, there appears to be a saint behind almost every unconventional, offbeat-sounding name an expectant Catholic couple could come up with for their as-yet-unnamed baby!).

Walburga helps those who suffer from coughs, dog bites, famine, hydrophobia, mad dogs, plague, and rabies.  She is the patron saint of boatmen, farmers, harvests, mariners, and sailors.  Her feast is celebrated on February 25.

If you'd like to have a Heavenly protector chosen for you, to help you and guide you throughout the coming year, you should give Jen's Saints Name Generator a whirl.  There's a special friend up there who can't wait to watch over you in 2014, I just know it!