Saint Paschal Baylon

Saint Paschal Baylon was a Spanish shepherd who became a Franciscan lay brother and spent his whole life in the simple tasks of the friary. He became known for his great love of the Blessed Sacrament and is the patron of Eucharistic congresses and works. The Church commemorates him on May 17.

He was born on May 16, 1540, at Torrehermosa in Aragon, into a poor family. It was the day of Pentecost, which in Spain was called Pascua, and this gave him his name. From the age of seven to twenty-four he tended sheep. He never went to school, but he taught himself to read from prayer books. A well-to-do farmer for whom he worked wanted to adopt him and make him his heir, but Paschal refused, because he longed to become a Franciscan.

At eighteen he asked to be admitted to the friary of Our Lady of Loreto, which belonged to the Franciscans of the reform of Saint Peter of Alcantara, known as Alcantarines. He was not accepted then, perhaps because of his youth. He entered the order in 1564. Although his superiors encouraged him to receive holy orders, he remained a lay brother to the end of his life, because he considered himself unworthy of the priesthood. He refused important offices and chose the humblest work; among other things he was porter at the friaries of Xàtiva and Valencia.

The Eucharist was the center of his life. He spent every free moment in adoration of the Blessed Sacrament, and his brothers told of the ecstasies into which he fell during prayer. In 1576 the provincial sent him with important documents to the minister general of the order in Paris. The journey through France, torn by the wars of religion, was dangerous: Calvinists beat, mocked and insulted him, and at Orléans, after a heated dispute about the real presence of Christ in the Eucharist, he was nearly stoned.

Though he had almost no education, many came to him for counsel, and his brothers valued his wisdom in matters of faith. After returning from France he wrote down a collection of sayings on the real presence of Christ in the Eucharist and on the authority of the pope; he was called the seraph of the Eucharist. Worn out by fasting and mortification, he died after receiving Communion on May 17, 1592, in the friary at Villarreal near Valencia, again on the day of Pentecost. According to tradition, at his funeral, at the moment of the elevation, he opened his eyes to adore Christ once more.

Pope Paul V beatified him on October 29, 1618, and Alexander VIII enrolled him among the saints on October 16, 1690. In 1897 Pope Leo XIII proclaimed him patron of Eucharistic congresses and works. His cult grew especially in Spain and southern Italy, and from there it reached Central and South America.