The calendar of saints is a traditional Christian method of organizing a liturgical year by
associating each day with one or more saints and referring to the day as the feast day
or feast of said saint.
The system arose from the early Christian custom of annual commemoration of martyrs
on the dates of their deaths, or birth into heaven, a date that is therefore referred
to in Latin as their dies natalis.
In the Eastern Orthodox Church, a calendar of saints is called a Menologion.
"Menologion" may also mean a set of icons on which saints are depicted in the order
of the dates of their feasts, often made in two panels.
History As the number of recognized saints increased
during Late Antiquity and the first half of the Middle Ages, eventually every day of the
year had at least one saint who was commemorated on that date.
To deal with this increase, some saints were moved to alternate days in some traditions
or completely removed, with the result that some saints have different feast days in different
calendars.
For example, Ss.
Perpetua and Felicity died on 7 March, but this date was later assigned to St. Thomas
Aquinas, allowing them only a commemoration, so in 1908 they were moved one day earlier.
When the 1969 reform of the Catholic calendar moved him to 28 January, they were moved back
to 7 March.
Both days can thus be said to be their feast day, in different traditions.
The Roman Catholic calendars of saints in their various forms, which list those saints
celebrated in the entire church, contains only a selection of the saints for each of
its days.
A fuller list is found in the Roman Martyrology, and some of the saints there may be celebrated
locally.
The earliest feast days of saints were those of martyrs, venerated as having shown for
Christ the greatest form of love, in accordance with the teaching: "Greater love has no one
than this, that someone lay down his life for his friends."
Saint Martin of Tours is said to be the first or at least one of the first non-martyrs to
be venerated as a saint.
The title "confessor" was used for such saints, who had confessed their faith in Christ by
their lives rather than by their deaths.
Martyrs are regarded as dying in the service of the Lord, and confessors are people who
died natural deaths.
A broader range of titles was used later, such as: Virgin, Pastor, Bishop, Monk, Priest,
Founder, Abbot, Apostle, Doctor of the Church.
The Tridentine Missal has common formulas for Masses of Martyrs, Confessors who were
bishops, Doctors of the Church, Confessors who were not Bishops, Abbots, Virgins, Non-Virgins,
Dedication of Churches, and Feast Days of the Blessed Virgin Mary.
Pope Pius XII added a common formula for Popes.
The 1962 Roman Missal of Pope John XXIII omitted the common of Apostles, assigning a proper
Mass to every feast day of an Apostle.
The present Roman Missal has common formulas for the Dedication of Churches, the Blessed
Virgin Mary, Martyrs, Pastors, Doctors of the Church, Virgins, and Saints.
This calendar system, when combined with major church festivals and movable and immovable
feasts, constructs a very human and personalised yet often localized way of organizing the
year and identifying dates.
Some Christians continue the tradition of dating by saints' days: their works may appear
"dated" as "The Feast of Saint Martin".
Poets such as John Keats commemorate the importance of The Eve of Saint Agnes.
As different denominations of Christianity developed, differing lists of saints began
as the same individual may be considered a saint or doctor by one denomination and a
heretic by another, as in the case of Nestorius.
Ranking of feast days
Feast days are ranked in accordance with their importance.
In the present ordinary form of the Roman Rite, feast days are ranked as solemnities,
feasts or memorials.
The 1962 version, whose use is authorized by the motu proprio Summorum Pontificum as
an extraordinary form of the Roman Rite, divides liturgical days into I, II, III, and IV class
days, as decreed by Pope John XXIII in 1960.
Those who use even earlier forms of the Roman Rite rank feast days as Doubles, Semidoubles,
and Simples.
See Ranking of liturgical days in the Roman Rite.
In the Eastern Orthodox Church the ranking of feasts varies from church to church.
In the Russian Orthodox Church they are: Great Feasts, middle, and minor feasts.
Each portion of such feasts may also be called feasts as follows: All-Night Vigils, Polyeleos,
Great Doxology, Sextuple.
There are also distinctions between Simple feasts and Double.
In Double Feasts the order of hymns and readings for each feast are rigidly instructed in Typikon,
the liturgy book.
In the Church of England, there are Principal Feasts and Principal Holy Days, Festivals,
Lesser Festivals, and Commemorations.
See also
General Roman Calendar Calendar of saints
Calendar of saints Calendar of saints
Coptic Orthodox calendar of saints Eastern Orthodox liturgical calendar
List of saints Movable feast
Name day Patron saint
References
External links Today's Saints on the Calendar
Greek Catholic Saints' Calendar Calendar of Saints
Butler's Lives of the Saints Bartleby.com