Saint Barbara's Day

Saint Barbara Depicted Aiding Miners

My copy of "The Festival of Christmas" copyright 1954, lists December 4th as Saint Barbara's Day.  A quick search on Wikipedia (free research - you get what you pay for) told me that sometime in the 1960 the Vatican removed Saint Barbara's Day from the calendar, but that it is still honored in the Orthodox Church.  She is the patron saint for miners and those in the artillery, among others.

I don't know much about saint veneration, but I'll offer an extra prayer for those who work in literally explosive situations.










I did have the opportunity to visit Saint Barbara's Cathedral in the Kutna Hora, Czech Republic last summer. I thought it was a beautiful place.

 We also went to the Ossuary (Bone Collection Chapel) there.  Those are real human bones in the photo below.  It was a little eerie.  We went in thinking that the bones were plague victims, but the literature there said that they were casualties of the Hussite Wars. 

John Huss was a church reformer who preceded Luther by about 100 years.  He thought that bibles should be written and read in the language of the people.  Condemned as a heretic, he was burned at the stake.  Different groups of people took up his cause and that of the established church. This Ossuary is where the church laid to rest their honored dead.

Decorations from the Ossuary

Saint Barbara's Cathedral and the Jesuit College

I am so honored to be able to have participated in a project in the Czech Republic in which Catholics and Evangelicals have collaborated.  There might just be hope for us yet.