Daily Martyrology for March 3

In 1955, in Philadelphia, Blessed Catherine Drexel. She was born in Philadelphia in 1858 in an affluent family which was very concerned about the poor. An heiress at a young age, she was alerted to the plight of the American Indians by Bishop Martin Marty. She discussed the matter with Pope Leo XIII and visited the missions in the Dakotas, where she met Chief Red Cloud, who admired her. She founded the Order of the Blessed Sacrament to minister to people of color. In 1915 she established Xavier University in New Orleans She spent the last twenty years of her life in prayerful retirement.

In 1039, at the monastery of Kaufungen, St. Kunegunde, wife of St. Henry II. At her urging, Henry founded the monastery and cathedral of Bamberg and the monastery of Kaufungen, to which she retired after his death. There she spent fifteen years in prayer and service as an ordinary nun. She now shares a joint feast day with St. Henry on July 13.

In 1716, Blesseds Liberatus Weiss, Samuel Marzorati and Michael Fasoli, Franciscan missionaries and martyrs. In response to a request from a ruler in Ethiopia, they were sent there to bring about a reunion of the Monophysite Ethiopian Christians and the Roman Church. Political instability in Ethiopia led to their arrest and execution by stoning.

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Our daily martyrology was written by Fr. Hugh Feiss, OSB. Copyright © 2008 by the Monastery of the Ascension, Jerome, ID 83338.