Irene: Name Day and Patron Saint

St Irene was born in the fourth century in the city of Magedon, the daughter of a pagan ruler named Licinius, who called her Penelope. When she was six, her father shut her away in a tower to keep her from the world, but her tutor, Apellian, was a Christian and taught her about Christ and the life of virtue. After a vision of a dove bearing an olive branch, she refused the marriage her parents planned, was baptized by a priest named Timothy, and took the name Irene, which means peace. She broke her father’s idols. In his anger he had her thrown beneath wild horses, but the horses stood still, and one of them turned on Licinius himself. At her prayer he was restored, and he, his wife and some three thousand others were baptized. In the years that followed Irene was cast into a pit of serpents, shut in heated bronze, and put to many other torments, yet God preserved her, and through her preaching and miracles many thousands came to Christ. At last, at Ephesus, she foresaw her end, entered a new tomb and asked that it be sealed; two days later it was found empty. The Church honors her as a great martyr on 5 May (18 May on the Old Calendar). By tradition she is asked to help young people toward a good marriage, she is patroness of the island of Thera, called Santorini after her, and in Greece the police keep her as their patron.

What the faithful pray for

• young people seeking a good marriage
• peace in families and between enemies
• parents and children estranged by faith
• police officers and all who keep order
• courage to confess Christ