The Blessing of Throats – A Spiritual Flu Shot

Source: thecatholicsun.org

This unusual winter calls for all the ammunition we can get in the fight against COVID, colds and flus. A spiritual help comes from the invocation of Saint Blaise. On February 3, the Church commemorates Blaise, a fourth century physician and bishop in Armenia.

We know about him mostly because he is the saint invoked in the famous blessing of throats that takes place in many parish communities on that day. We know more about the widespread devotion to St Blaise by Christians around the world than we know about the saint himself. There are conflicting versions of stories about his powers to heal.

Blaise, who had studied philosophy in his youth, was a doctor in Sebaste in Armenia, the city of his birth. He is supposed to have exercised his art with miraculous ability, good-will, and piety. When the bishop of the city died, Blaise was chosen to succeed him, with the acclamation of all the people. His holiness was manifest through many miracles. From all around, people came to him to find cures for their spirit and their body. It’s said that even wild animals came in herds to receive his blessing.

In 316, Agricola, the governor of Cappadocia and of Lesser Armenia arrived in Sebaste at the order of the emperor to kill the Christians. He arrested Blaise. As he was being led to prison, a mother set her only son, choking to death of a fish-bone, at his feet. Touched at her grief, he offered up his prayers, and the child was cured straight away.

Regardless, the governor, unable to make Blaise renounce his faith, beat him with a stick, ripped his flesh with iron combs, and beheaded him. Consequently, Saint Blaise is invoked for protection against injuries and illnesses of the throat.

Another story has it that as the governor’s hunters led Blaise back to Sebaste, on the way, they met a poor woman whose pig had been seized by a wolf. At the command of Blaise, the wolf restored the pig to its owner, alive and unhurt. When he had reached the capital and was in prison awaiting execution, the old woman whose pig he had saved came to see him, bringing two fine wax candles to dispel the gloom of his dark cell.

Regardless of the circumstances of his life and death, in many places on his feast day, the blessing of St Blaise is given: two candles are blessed, but not lit. The priest holds them in a crossed position over the heads of the faithful or on the throat, while giving this blessing: “Through the intercession of Saint Blaise, bishop and martyr, may God deliver you from every disease of the throat and from every other illness. In the name of the Father and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit.”

In iconography, Blaise is represented holding two crossed candles in his hand or in a cave surrounded by wild beasts. In addition to being the patron of those with throat ailments, he is invoked for many other physical and mental ailments, wild animals, veterinarians, many towns and villages, and many workers and craftsmen.

I’m sure that the prayers to St Blaise really do help. However, just in case, I will still get my flu shot each October and resort to throat lozenges and wait anxiously to receive the vaccine for COVID.

Philip Shano, SJ has many years of rich and varied experience working with Ignatian spirituality: teaching, writing and using it in his ministry. He resides in the Jesuit community in Pickering, Ontario.

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4 Comments
  • Peter Bisson
    Posted at 02:09h, 03 February Reply

    Thank you Philip!

  • graeme quinlan
    Posted at 05:19h, 03 February Reply

    If Saint Blaise can help me then I am all for his intercession. In God I trust, I shall not fear rejection. I have sought healing for my throat for many years now to no avail.Now I will turn to St Blaise and allow my trust with him to work with the Grace of God to bring this healing for me.Be it Gods will not mine, be done.

  • Bernice Dookhan-Khan
    Posted at 10:03h, 03 February Reply

    Thanks Fr. Shano. God bless.

  • Jim Radde
    Posted at 13:45h, 03 February Reply

    Philip, I enjoyed it.

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