St. Wenceslaus

Who they were

Wenceslaus was Duke of Bohemia. The carol promoted him to king and history let it stand. He was raised in the faith by his grandmother Ludmila, who was murdered by his mother's pagan leaning faction, which tells you how lethal the family politics were.

Taking power young, he governed by a programme the chronicles found remarkable: churches built, clergy protected, captives ransomed, and a personal practice of carrying alms to the poor at night, which is the seed of fact under the carol's snow. In 935 his brother Boleslav invited him to a feast and had him cut down at the church door the next morning, and Wenceslaus died, tradition says, forgiving him. Bohemia acclaimed him martyr and patron almost at once, and his crown became the nation's symbol. A millennium later a nineteenth century English carol made him the English speaking world's image of cold weather charity, and created a small calendar joke: his feast is in September, but the song marches him through the snow on 26 December, the feast of St. Stephen.

Why people turn to St. Wenceslaus

Leaders who serve personally, with St. Louis IX. Czech and Slovak families. And everyone whose charity has a winter, since the carol's practical devotion is the real one: go out to the person in the cold, and bring fuel.

How to ask their intercession

The carol's examination works in any season. Whose footsteps am I walking in, and who is walking in mine?