This is a true story.
So, I was struck by lightning.
Dramatic pause.
Well, to be honest it wasn't me so much as policraticus. At the beginning of August we had some wicked weather (no offense NOLA/Galveston) and the upshot was that pretty much every piece of technology in the house was in some way shorted out, fused, melted or otherwise rendered into so much scrap. Check this ( Read more... )
Dramatic pause.
Well, to be honest it wasn't me so much as policraticus. At the beginning of August we had some wicked weather (no offense NOLA/Galveston) and the upshot was that pretty much every piece of technology in the house was in some way shorted out, fused, melted or otherwise rendered into so much scrap. Check this ( Read more... )
I've checked the obvious sources... catholic encyc. As for my girl, the fact that she's in the church with 2 of the maries is strange. And that she's venerated yearly, albet only since the 19th C on record, is interesting.
I'd like to write a few lives of the girl... if I can't find any. Since she's so multifaceted, it could be a whole series.
So, where did you get this? "One who is variously described as a pagan priestess, a African servant, a gypsy princess, a avatar of the Hindu goddess of death, Kali and a vampire?" From my post on wikipedia? Don't trust it. But that's what I've found so far. I can't see why she isn't all of them. Women always have to do ALL the work. Anyway, the gypsie/roma didn't appear in the west from india until the 14th C, and they called themselves gypsies meaning from egypt... but were from india... thus the kali ref... so it is all congruent. As for me... sarahs' my saint. How could she not be. She's as virtual a reventant as ever stalked cyberspace... as am I. As are we all.
Thanks for the feeback/comments.
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These kind of local, unofficial, semi-legandary saints are very common--although they rarely have Sara's varied resume. Take for example Bawburg's St. Walstan and his mother St. Blythe. There is no evidence that he ever really existed, and his cult was never accepted by any bishop, much less the pope and it never spread further afield, but even today people in the area celebrate his feast.
http://www.bawburghnews.freeserve.co.uk/saint_walstan_legend.htm
I especially like the part about how his two oxen carried his dead body magically to the church.
Anyway, its important to remember that while becoming a saint today is incredibly difficult, in the earliest times it was much more democratic. No person was "declared" a saint by the pope until the 10th c., so that is 1000 years of more or less ad hoc sainthood going on all across Christendom. Basically, if you were a good enough person, pius, and had done some pretty unselfish things in your life you stood a chance of people, many of them your freinds in life, starting prayers to you as soon as you were cold. Martyrdom, of course, helped enormously. Most of the earliest saints were all somehow guesomely murdered by the Romans, or similar. There were very few saints until after Constantine. When Christianity came up from the underground Christian antiquarians began poking around the catacombs in Rome looking for the saints of the dark days of persecution. Nostalgia, ya know? This led to some fairly embarassing things like "St. Dexter," from taking a direction sign (to the right) as a tomb marker. That is why the Church was always trying to verify and cross checking the reality of saints as true, living and dying people, not just conveinent fictions. That is why they started the whole "declaring" thing. Still, it was only in the 20th c. that they purged stories like St. Christopher and St. Barbara.
I actually got the Kali stuff from some weird French cyber-tourist site that I have now lost, but who knows, they may have ganked it from you first. And don't worry, I'm pretty Wikiphobic.
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