14 Holy Helpers Oil + 15% off Blessing/Healing formulas, 2 days only

The Fourteen Holy Helpers are saints or holy figures who were petitioned in medieval Europe during the terror of the Black Death. Also known as the “auxiliary saints,” they were called on as a group for protection from a variety of illnesses and troubles that would strike both people and animals. Their popularity continues to this day.

While you will occasionally see variations in a few of the names depending on region, the “standard” 14 Holy Helpers and their particular areas of specialty are as follows:

• Agathius – headache, agonizing pain
• Barbara – fever, sudden death, fire
• Blaise – illnesses of the throat and protection for domestic animals
• Catherine of Alexandria – sudden death, diseases of tongue
• Christopher – plague, sudden death, and temptations while traveling
• Cyriacus – temptation on one’s death bed, eye disease, possession
• Denis – headache, demonic possession
• Erasmus (aka St. Elmo) – intestinal and stomach troubles
• Eustace – family discord and strife, fire
• George – domestic animals, boils, lesions
• Giles – plague, for good confessions, for the maimed and beggars, epilepsy, mental illness, nightmares, panic
• Margaret of Antioch – childbirth, protection from devils, headache, backache
• Pantaleon – physicians, midwives, against cancer and TB
• Vitus (aka St. Guy)- epilepsy, lightning and storms, protection for animals and from animal bites

I released this oil years ago as part of an expanded line of blessing, uncrossing, and protection formulas, having no idea at the time that we’d one day be facing a sort of modern plague of our own. So I figured now’s a good time to make another batch of this stuff.

One of those multi-use spiritual oils that’s worth keeping in the supply cupboard because one little bottle does so much.

Enjoy 15% off tangibles in the Blessing, Healing, Protection, Uncrossing, Spiritual Cleansing, and Saints/Spirits categories on any order totaling $20 or more, at Seraphin Station or at Etsy. Offer good now through midnight CST on Monday the 17th. Discount is automatic – no coupon code necessary.

Read more or order now at Seraphin Station.

N.B. Not a medicine and not a substitute for proper medical treatment by a qualified medical practitioner.

Angry Angels and Saints Who Smite

Dusting off this article from 2013 because someone asked about St. Michael and punitive miracles.

Big Lucky Hoodoo

I’m posting this as a blog entry 1. because I can’t seem to comment on Mama Cat’s blog (maybe she turned off comments or my browser is jacked up), and 2. I don’t want to take over her blog with my rambling anyway. Anyway, this is in response to her blog post here. I just want to chime in on the “saints punishing you” thing (if you read this whole thing, you’ll see that I am not disagreeing with her – I’m just elaborating).

People tend to think of saints as benevolent entities, close to God, involved in helping the devoted. Actually, there is an extremely long tradition of punitive miracles even in quite orthodox Catholic practice. I go into this a bit in this blog post. If you read the Old Testament, it’s full of them; God smote the hell out of all kinds of people, and…

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St. Martha, from Gospel Figure to Medieval Legend to La Dominadora: Sources, Resources, and FAQs

St. Martha in Scripture

Woodcut by Jacobus de Man, haven’t tracked down the specific publication yet, but it’s late 1600s, early 1700s and public domain. [1]

“Now Jesus loved Martha and her sister and Lazarus.”
– John 11:5

The Gospel of Luke tells us how Martha invited Jesus to her home in Bethany. She cooked and cleaned and catered while her sister Mary sat at Christ’s feet and listened to him speak. Martha pointed out that Mary wasn’t pitching in.

“Martha, Martha,” the Lord answered, “you are worried and upset about many things, but few things are needed—or indeed only one. Mary has chosen what is better, and it will not be taken away from her.” (Luke 10:41, NIV)

Christ’s point is that in the grand scheme of things, your eternal soul is more important than social conventions and what people think about your housekeeping. But we need to understand this in context. It’s not that Martha had no imagination or faith or respect or that she was too small-minded to want to sit at Christ’s feet, too.

In Martha’s mind and in her culture, these were her duties, and her performance of them comprised her reputation, value, and trustworthiness as a member of her culture — in a society that valued hospitality quite highly, that in fact didn’t even work as a society without hospitality as a huge part of the glue that held it together.

She wasn’t saying nobody should value hearing him teach. She also wanted to hear him speak; she was also his disciple and believed in him. She was just pointing out that people needed to eat and wash and sit, and somebody’s efforts had to make that happen. (You can imagine that Jesus was accompanied by an entourage, too, all of whom also needed to eat and wash and sit.) She was determined to do her duties well for such an esteemed guest as Jesus, but she wasn’t a doormat. She was pointing out that she was not the only one who could be doing these things, that she *could* be sitting at Christ’s feet right now, too, if she just gave off doing the less glamorous stuff. But somebody has to do it. Dramatic events are unfolding, but somebody has to make the setting they’re unfolding in happen.

In John 12, Christ is in Bethany again before Passover at a dinner in his honor. Lazarus is reclined at the table with him. Word of his resurrection has spread like wildfire; Jesus’ followers are increasing and so are the machinations against his life. Mary makes a spectacle of herself pouring half of liter of precious perfume on Christ’s feet – worth a year’s wages – and wiping them with her hair. Christ is constantly, increasingly aware of the massive cosmic drama he’s part of and what’s right around the corner, his every action and word heavily symbolic. Every step he takes is under the weight of prophecy and its fulfillment, is part of a massive dramatic ritual. In this play, Christ has simultaneously the perspective of the main character and the omniscience of the author. The drama in John’s portrayal is thick indeed.

Martha during all of this? John writes only, “Martha served” (John 12:2).