St. Luke Casali was educated by the abbot of the monastery of Saint Philip at Agira, Sicily, Italy. He eventually joined the monastic community himself and became the reluctant abbot of his house.  St. Luke eventually, for unknown reasons, went blind. One day while they were travelling to Nicosia, one his monks tried to play a trick on the blind abbot by telling him that some townspeople...

St. Albinus was born to a noble family of Brittany and grew to be a pious child. He became a monk from his mid-20's into his 60's at Timcillac, which later renamed itself Saint Aubin's in his honor. He was elected Abbot for 25 years, beginning in 504. In 529 he was installed as Bishop of the diocese of Angers, France from c.529. His episcopacy was known for his charity to the poor,...

Chapdelaine was born on a farm in La Rochelle-Normande, France. By the age of twenty, he had entered the seminary at Coutances. He was ordained a priest in 1843 and in 1851 joined the Institute of Foreign Missions in Paris. He left from Antwerp in April 1852 to join the Catholic mission in the Guangxi province of China. The Taiping Rebellion led to suspicion of Christians and foreigners were...

Grigor Narekatsi, anglicized: Gregory of Narek was an Armenian mystical and lyrical poet, monk, and theologian. He is a saint of the Armenian Apostolic Church and was declared a Doctor of the Church by Pope Francis in 2015. The son of a bishop, Narekatsi was educated by a relative based at the Narekavank, the monastery of Narek, on the southern shores of Lake Van (modern Turkey). He was based...

Victor was born in northern France and exhibited remarkable piety at a very early age.  His greatest loves, even as a youth were prayer, fasting, and serving the poor. He was ordained a priest but knew that God was calling him to a life of solitary devotion, and accordingly retired to a lonely outpost in the region of his birth, where he passed the rest of his life (no one knows exactly...