Saint Lucy

Lucy was a young Christian of Syracuse in Sicily who died in the persecution of Diocletian in 304. Her veneration is very ancient. An inscription from Syracuse from about 400 already names her, she is named in the Roman Canon of the Mass, and churches were dedicated to her across Italy.

According to her Acts, written later, she was of a wealthy family and had secretly vowed her virginity to God. Her mother, Eutychia, suffered from a long illness. Lucy took her to pray at the tomb of Saint Agatha in Catania, and her mother was healed. Lucy then persuaded her to give Lucy’s dowry to the poor. The young man she had been promised to was enraged at losing the money and denounced her as a Christian. The governor ordered her to sacrifice to the gods, and she refused. He ordered her dragged to a brothel, but, the story says, no force could move her. Attempts to burn her failed too, and at last she was killed with a sword.

Later legends added that her eyes were torn out, or that she herself gave them up, and so she is often painted holding her eyes on a dish. She is invoked for the blind and for all who suffer in their eyes.

Her name comes from lux, light. Before the calendar reform of 1582, her feast on 13 December fell near the shortest day of the year. In Sweden and Norway girls in white with crowns of candles still bring light and saffron buns on Saint Lucy’s morning.