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Peter Gonzalez, Saint

(Encyclopedia)Peter Gonzalez, Saint gŏnzāˈlĭs [key], 1190–1246, Spanish Dominican priest. He worked first among the Moors, then among the mariners of NW Spain. As a patron of sailors he acquired the name St. ...

Barnabas, Saint

(Encyclopedia)Barnabas, Saint bärˈnəbəs [key], Christian apostle. He was a Cypriot and a relative of St. Mark; his forename was Joseph. Several passages in the New Testament relate that Barnabas was a teacher a...

Vitus, Saint

(Encyclopedia)Vitus, Saint vīˈtəs [key], 4th cent.?, Sicilian martyr. Vitus is invoked against diseases including epilipsy, nervous disorders, and St. Vitus' Dance (Sydenham's chorea). He is one of the Fourteen ...

Clotilda, Saint

(Encyclopedia)Clotilda, Saint klətĭlˈdə [key], d. 545, Frankish queen. She converted her husband, Clovis I, to Christianity and built with him in Paris the Church of the Apostles Peter and Paul, later renamed (...

Porres, Saint Martin de

(Encyclopedia)Porres, Saint Martin de märtēnˈ dā pôrˈrās [key], 1579–1639, Peruvian Dominican lay brother, b. Lima. He was the son of a Spanish soldier and a black freedwoman from Panama. Apprenticed to a ...

Lalande, Jean

(Encyclopedia)Lalande, Jean (Saint John Lalande) zhäN läläNdˈ [key], d. 1646, French Jesuit missionary in Canada and New York, one of the Jesuit Martyrs of North America. He came to the New World in 1644. He ac...

Simon, Saint

(Encyclopedia)Simon, Saint sīˈmən [key], in the New Testament, one of the Twelve Apostles. In the Gospels he is called the Canaanite or Cananaean or Zelotes, synonymous terms referring probably to association wi...

midsummer day and midsummer night

(Encyclopedia)midsummer day and midsummer night, names given to the feast of the nativity of St. John the Baptist (June 24) and the preceding night (St. John's Eve, June 23). Because midsummer is about the time of ...

Saint Valentine's Day

(Encyclopedia)Saint Valentine's Day, Western European Christian holiday, originally the Roman feast of Lupercalia. It was christianized in memory of the martyrdom of St. Valentine in a.d. 270, who, in medieval time...

Sainte Anne, Lac

(Encyclopedia)Sainte Anne, Lac, lake, 21 sq mi (54.5 sq km), central Alta., Canada, west of Edmonton. It has a maximum depth of 30 ft (9 m). The village of Lac Ste Anne, on the lake's south shore, was the site of t...