From the desk of the Tar Heel disciple:
December 15, 2025 (#60)
St. Lucy, virgin and martyr
December 13 is the feast day of St. Lucy, patroness of the blind and those with afflictions of the eyes. Devotion in the Church to this virgin-martyr is ancient. In addition to her feast day, she is numbered among the select group of woman saints remembered in the first Eucharistic Prayer, also known as the Roman Canon. She is often portrayed as holding a plate on which sit her eyeballs, which alone makes her very memorable. And in another cultural manifestation, her feast day in Sweden is still observed by some young girls and women by wearing a crown of candles on their heads in her honor.
She was born about 283 AD, in Syracuse, Sicily, to a prosperous noble family. Her father, who died when she was very young, appears to have been a Roman, while her mother may have been of Greek ancestry. She was raised as a Christian and at a tender age made a commitment to preserve her virginity and live her life as a celibate woman for the sake of the Kingdom of God and her love of Jesus Christ. Her mother, however, arranged an engagement with a prosperous young man.
Lucy had an opportunity to change her mother's mind as the result of a pilgrimage the two of them made to the tomb of St. Agatha, in Catania, about 50 miles away. The mother had suffered for many years from a significant hemorrhage and Lucy convinced her mother to make the pilgrimage to seek a cure through the intercession of St. Agatha (another virgin-martyr who had been executed for her faith in 251 AD). While there, she was cured, and Lucy revealed her plans and motivation to refuse the engagement, which the grateful mother accepted. The proposed bridegroom, a pagan, did not, and he denounced her to the civil authorities. She was tried for her Christian faith, and refusing to renounce it, was condemned to serve in a brothel. However, when the soldiers proceeded to remove her, according to the story handed down, she could not be moved. The judge then ordered a fire to be set around her, but the flames did her no harm. Finally, she was put to death by sword, in 304 AD, at about the age of twenty. Later traditions indicated that her eyes were gouged out as part of her torture or that she herself removed her eyes, which her fiancé had found so maddeningly attractive.
For much of the Middle Ages, at least in the northern hemisphere, her feast day occurred on the shortest day of the year. The inauguration of the Gregorian calendar in 1582 (which caused the “skipping” of 10 days at its commencement) meant that the date of the Winter Solstice no longer occurred on December 13, but the customs associated with “light festivals” that had developed in earlier centuries perdured in many places (e.g., Sweden).
Her witness to Christ the Bridegroom continues to shine for those who learn of her faithful witness and her intercession can be a comfort for all believers, especially for those suffering afflictions of their eyesight.
Devotional materials related to St. Lucy can be found at:
https://inhisname.com/search?options%5Bprefix%5D=last&q=lucy
