Martin of Tours: A Saint for Recovery

Today the Church celebrates the Memorial of Saint Martin of Tours. This would seem to be providential in the United States as we celebrate Veterans Day, because soldiers is one of the great many things and people he is patron saint of. One of the others on the list is recovering alcoholics. This struck me initially as interesting.

Martin was a soldier, so it makes perfect sense that he hold that title. Usually the things over which a saint serves as patron are things that impacted them in the course of their earthly lives. So was good Saint Martin a fellow?

I think (and this is just my opinion) that he is a perfect fit for a patron of recovering addicts of every sort because of this interesting story about his spirituality, taken from the Office of Readings for today:

He summoned his brethren and told them he was dying. All who heard this were overcome with grief. In their sorrow they cried to him with one voice: “Father, why are you deserting us? Who will care for us when you are gone? Savage wolves will attack your flock, and who will save us from their bite when our shepherd is struck down? We know you long to be with Christ, but your reward is certain and will not be any less for being delayed. You will do better to show pity for us, rather than forsake us.”

Thereupon he broke into tears, for he was a man in whom the compassion of our Lord was continually revealed. Turning to our Lord, he made this reply to their pleading: “Lord, if your people still need me, I am ready for the task; your will be done.”

Here was a man words cannot describe. Death could not defeat him nor toil dismay him. He was quite without a preference of his own; he neither feared to die nor refused to live.

How powerful! “He neither feared to die nor refused to live.” He pushed none of his own preferences forward and submitted himself wholly and entirely to the will of God. Step 11 of the 12 Steps of Alcoholics Anonymous (and the other 12 Step Fellowships) reads: “Sought through prayer and meditation to improve our conscious contact with God as we understood Him, praying only for knowledge of His will for us and the power to carry that out.”

Doesn’t Saint Martin exemplify this notion so perfectly! Even in the final moments of his life, his only prayer was that God’s will be done, and that he be granted the strength to carry it out. The message here is not just for those who struggle with addiction, it’s for all of us!

Imagine if all of us were able to go through our lives with that same confidence? Imagine how different our days would be if we didn’t worry about anything at all, not even death! Imagine if our only concern was moving through our day doing the next right thing, and letting God handle the rest. The truth is that’s exactly what God wants for us.

At every Mass we are reminded of this truth, when after the Lord’s Prayer the celebrant asks on our behalf that we be “free from sin and safe from all distress”…or anxiety, as it used to say. When we drown in stress, anxiety, or distress, sin follows not far behind. When we are drowning in our fears and resentments, all those unhealthy escapes (which we all have) assuredly will rear their ugly heads.

So today we pray that with the intercession of Saint Martin, we too may “neither fear to die nor refuse to live.” May we be free from all sin and safe from all distress!

Saint Martin, pray for us!