Domine, fac de me sicut vis | Lord, do with me what you will
Years ago we adopted a New Year’s tradition of selecting a patron saint for the new year. This practice was inspired by what St. Faustina did in her order.
On the occasion of the New Year 1935 Saint Maria Faustina made this entry in her spiritual Diary: “Jesus likes to intervene in the smallest details of our life. And He often fulfills secret wishes of mine that I sometimes hide from Him, although I know that from Him nothing can be hidden. There is a custom among us of drawing by lot on New Year’s Day, special patrons for ourselves for the whole year…” ~ Saint Maria Faustina
We’ve used various techniques over the years to select our Saint. But our favorite remains our Missal or traditional book of the saints as we follow the Traditional Calendar and like to pool from the historical calendar as well.
Each family member who has received their First Holy Communion receives a patron saint for the new year. Younger children focus on growing devotion to their name sake.
Selecting a Saint of the Year
Materials:
- Missal
- Saint Book
- Random number generator (phone or computer)
We make our selections after our family devotions and specific prayers for the New Year.
Steps:
- Set Random Number Generator to number of pages in your missal or saint book that covers the saints
- Allow each family member to take at a turn at securing their “number” on the generator
- Look up the number generator in your Missal/Saint Book to find out which Saint you will have for the New Year
- Record Your Saint and feastday
- learn about your new patron saint and grow in devotion to him throughout the year
In regards to the word of the year, it is closely tied to the Saint of the Year — for spiritual growth. The saint selection is random but choosing my word of the year has always been a process — an examination of the past year. I take time for spiritual reading for this purpose and pray over it with my husband. I encourage you to choose a word for the year to remind you of what God is asking of you during this season in your life.
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