This year St. Nicholas and St. Lucy’s feast days fall on Sundays, which makes for a couple busy days!  Use this printable crown and cards to help your children remember to let the light of Christ shine through them, as St. Lucy did.

Who was St. Lucy? All that is really known about St. Lucy is that she was a young martyr during the Diocletian persecution of 304 A.D. The story passed down to us is that Lucy was born of noble parents, but her father died when she was around 5. Lucy devoted her virginity to the Lord, but her mother, not knowing this and looking to settle Lucy’s future since she was suffering from a bleeding disorder, arranged for her daughter to marry a wealthy pagan man. Lucy was told in a vision that her mother would be healed. Believing this, she told her mother to distribute their riches and the patrimony. When Lucy’s betrothed heard, he was angry and denounced her to the governor.  After Lucy refused the governor’s order to burn a sacrifice to the emperor’s image, she was sentenced to be defiled in a brothel. However, the guards could not move Lucy, even when they hitched her to a team of oxen. When they piled branches around her to burn her to death, the branches would not light. In the end, Lucy met her death by the sword.

“Saint Lucy, you did not hide your light under a basket, but let it shine for the whole world, for all the centuries to see. We may not suffer torture in our lives the way you did, but we are still called to let the light of our Christianity illumine our daily lives. Please help us to have the courage to bring our Christianity into our work, our recreation, our relationships, our conversation — every corner of our day. Amen”