Saint Luke the Evangelist

October 18 Saint of the Day Profile

October 18 Saint of the Day Profile Saint Luke the Evangelist

Profile:

Born to pagan Greek parents, and possibly a slave. One of the earliest converts to Christianity. Physician, studying in Antioch and Tarsus. Probably travelled as a ship's doctor; many charitable societies of physicians are named for him. Legend has that he was also a painter who may have done portraits of Jesus and Mary, but none have ever been correctly or definitively attributed to him; this story, and the inspiration his Gospel has always given artists, led to his patronage of them.

He met Saint Paul the Apostle at Troas, and evangelized Greece and Rome with him, being there for the shipwreck and other perils of the voyage to Rome, and stayed in Rome for Paul's two years of in prison. Wrote the Gospel According to Luke, much of which was based on the teachings and writings of Paul, interviews with early Christians, and his own experiences. Wrote a history of the early Church in the Acts of the Apostles.

Born

at Antioch

Died

• c.74 in Greece
• some stories say he was martyred, others that he died of natural causes
• relics at Padua, Italy

Patronage

artists, bachelors, bookbinders, brewers, butchers, doctors, glass makers, glassworkers, glaziers, gold workers, goldsmiths, lacemakers, lace workers, notaries, painters, physicians, sculptors, stained glass workers, surgeons, unmarried men, Worshipful Company of Painters, 2 cities

Representation

• physician
• bishop
• book
• brush (refers to the tradition that he was a painter)
• man accompanied by a winged ox
• man painting an icon of Blessed Virgin Mary
• ox
• palette (refers to the tradition that he was a painters)
• winged calf
• winged ox

Writings

• Canonical Gospel According to Luke
• Canonical Acts of the Apostles

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