St. John Francis Regis Novena Prayer Patron Saint of Regis University, Lacemakers, Poor, Sick, Regis High School (New York)

St. John Francis Regis Novena All 9 Days.

Novena	St. John Francis Regis Novena
Novena Begins	June 7
Feast Day	June 16
Patron Saint of	Regis University, Lacemakers, Poor, Sick, Regis High School (New York)

About St. John Francis Regis

John Francis Regis, born in 1597, of noble stock in a small town named Fontcouverte in the province of Gallia Narbonensis, showed indications of exceptional holiness from his earliest years. Even then there appeared in him marvelous moral innocence, ardent zeal for prayer, reserve, and outstanding modesty. At age nineteen, he entered the Society of Jesus in Toulouse and excelled in humility, obedience, charity, a lack of regard for self, and in other virtues of the religious life. When his studies were completed, he completely gave his entire self to bringing about the salvation of souls.

Having trudged the harsh mountains of the Vivarai, the Velay, and Forez, and the immense Swiss mountains, rough with ice and nearly constant snows, he undertook the teaching of their stubborn residents known for their ignorance, backward ways, and barbaric customs. He did this with such success that he brought back to the Catholic faith and to Christian piety innumerable individuals either badly influenced by Calvinistic teaching or corrupted with destructive morals.

Having worked the mission fields in the wintertime, he returned to Le Puy in the summer, and there in hospitals and prisons and in private homes, at crossroads, and in churches, he assisted all kinds of men and women, having “become all things to all” (1 Corinthians 9:22). He sustained the flocks of the poor with provisions gathered from all over, especially when famine was raging, even on more than one occasion by the miraculous multiplication of grain. Because of this, he was given the name “Father of the Poor.” By leading away from the mire of vices shameful and sinful people, it is scarcely believable how many reproaches and mocks he endured. Still he was always undaunted, with an erect and pleasant countenance, although swords were often jabbed toward his neck, blows struck to his mouth, and clubs to his body.

When the plague was raging, he was continually visiting those suffering from that illness and was refreshing them with ardent charity. Kind and obliging to others he was extremely harsh with himself, using rough hair shirts, iron chains, severe self-beatings, taking sleep briefly on a bare table or on the ground, and always very abstemious, subsisting on the most vile food, so that one could say that he hindered death more than he sustained life.

He was so on fire with the love of God that he seemed to breathe, speak and think only of it. He spent many hours of the night in prayer basking in heavenly delights, and he was often taken outside of his body. He was performing this divine exercise with such attention of mind, and with such ardor of expression, that the holiness with which he glowed was warming even those who were bystanders.

He was marvelously famous for miracles and other supernatural gifts. At length, called to the reward of his labors in a district in the Diocese of Vienne, whose name was La Louvesc, he was taken suddenly with a deadly illness contracted from his labors while a most cold winter was raging. Refreshed by heavenly light and invited to eternal joys, he gave back his spirit to his Creator in the year 1640 on the 31st day of December, in his forty-fourth year. His tomb was visited with the greatest devotion by an incredible number of people coming from everywhere across most difficult mountains on account of his sanctity and the report of his miracles, which were becoming especially frequent.

John Francis Regis was canonized in 1737.