Christians Courageous

For every half-dozen heroes antiquity could muster, Christendom produced thousands; and often from the strangest holes and corners. Instead of drying up the spirit of adventure, the Fire of Pentecost kindled it anew and made it burn with an unquenchable flame. The Master's parting instructions to His followers resulted in a host of enterprises quite as daring as any to be found in Homer.

Some of these are brought vividly to life in these stories about courageous Christians from the earliest days of Christianity to modern times. Although written primarily for youthful readers, they are sure to interest all those to whom the achievements of their fellow Christians are a matter of pride and encouragement.

Here you'll read about, among others:

• The pagan actor whose mockery of the Faith led him to convert and even die a Christian martyr
• The blind boy who became an adviser to great saints
• The brave bishop who successfully defended the true Faith against his fellow bishops and even the Emperor!
• The monk who was martyred in the Coliseum trying to stop the bloodshed of the gladiators there
• The priest who suffered cruel deprivations to convert a savage tribe with a dictionary!
• The Irish monk who crossed the Sea of Darkness to discover America
• The celebrated Spanish novelist who helped save Christendom from the Turks at the Battle of Lepanto
• The unarmed bishop who, with words alone, drove Attila the Hun from the gates of Rome

The stirring adventures of these brave Christian souls remind us that God has in hand for each of us a unique mission, worthy of all our imagination and of all our daring.

Msgr. Aloysius Roche (b. 1886), a parish priest in Essex, England, was a prolific and popular writer, famous for making the lives of the saints fascinating to persons young and old, and even to non-Christian readers.