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Did you know there was a saint canonized by Jesus Christ himself? It's in the Gospel of Luke! St. Dismas is the traditional name given to the penitent thief, the one who is being crucified alongside Jesus and asks Jesus to remember him when he enters the Kingdom. Jesus then promises that Dismas will see him in Paradise, thus making the executed criminal the first saint canonized by the church.  Though he is unnamed in Luke's gospel, the name Dismas comes from the apocryphal Gospel of Nicodemus. A few other non-canonical sources provide other names for him. Lifetime:  1st Century Region:  Galilee Patronages:  Prisoners; Funeral directors; Repentant thieves Iconograpy:  Being crucified; Often contorted Feast Day: March 25 Not much is known about Dismas, including whether that is even his name. That makes it kind of hard to write a bio about him, so instead I'll write some interesting information about the Penitent Thief here. Iconography The Penitent Thief is usually portraye

  St. Gertrude of Nivelles shares her feast day with the much more well-known St. Patrick on March 17, but any fans of cats will be interested to learn about her, as that is one of the areas over which she is a patron. She is also a patron of several Belgian and Dutch towns, as well as the Canons Regular of the Order of the Holy Cross, a religious order more commonly known as the Croziers. Lifetime: 628-659 Region:  Austrasia (modern Belgium and Netherlands) Patronages:  Cats; Travellers; Gardeners; Mental illness Iconograpy:  Cat or mice/rats; Flowers; Benedictine habit Feast Day: March 17 In a pattern that should sound familiar to anyone who knows the history of many early women saints, Gertrude was born to a noble family and grew up surrounded by wealth and politics. When she was ten, her father held a party where the king offered her to be betrothed to a duke. She lost her temper and refused, vowing even at such a young age that she would marry only Christ. Before her father could