St Anthony Mary Claret: Life, Feast Day and Prayer

St Anthony Mary Claret (1807-1870) was a Catalan weaver who became one of the great missionaries of the nineteenth century: founder of the Missionary Sons of the Immaculate Heart of Mary, the Claretians, Archbishop of Santiago de Cuba, confessor of Queen Isabella II of Spain, and a Father of the First Vatican Council. He was canonized by Pope Pius XII on 7 May 1950, and in the calendar of 1962 his feast is kept on 23 October as a feast of the third class. Here is his life, from Butler's Lives of the Saints and his own Autobiography, his famous Apostolic Prayer, the Collect of his Mass in Latin and English, and the answers to the questions most often asked about him.

Who is St Anthony Mary Claret?

His full name, Antonio María Claret y Clará, sounds grand; his origins were humble. He was born on 23 December 1807 at Sallent, in Catalonia, in the north-east of Spain, the fifth of the eleven children of Juan and Josefa Claret. As a young man he practised his father's trade of cloth-weaving, and in his spare time, Butler tells us, he learned Latin and printing. Both would serve him: the Latin for the altar, the printing for an apostolate of the press that few priests of his century equalled.

At twenty-two he entered the seminary of Vich (Vic), and he was ordained priest on 13 June 1835. Twice he tried to leave Spain for a more hidden or more distant life. He thought first of the Carthusians, but his health seemed unequal to it. Then he went to Rome and entered the Jesuit novitiate, hoping to be sent to the foreign missions; there his health broke down, and the Father General of the Society of Jesus advised him to go home and evangelize his own countrymen. The sons of St Ignatius of Loyola thus gave Spain its great missionary by sending him back.

The childhood of St Anthony Mary Claret

The questions about his childhood are frequent, and the answers are simple. He grew up at Sallent in a hard-working Christian family, was taught the faith at home and at the parish, and learned the weaver's trade from his father, working in the family business before going to live, still a young man, in the city of Barcelona. His parents, he writes, were "upright, and God-fearing people, very devoted to the Blessed Sacrament and Mary Most Holy", and he never forgot the catechism lessons of his boyhood: alone in Barcelona, surrounded by evil, he would imagine those good people speaking to him and warning him away from it.

His Autobiography, written out of obedience, shows that the thought of eternity and the salvation of souls took hold of him early, and that devotion to Our Lady accompanied him from childhood. When he left the looms for the seminary at twenty-two, he brought with him the habits of work, precision and endurance that the mills had taught him.

The missionary of Catalonia and the founder of the Claretians

For about ten years Father Claret gave missions and retreats across Catalonia and later the Canary Islands, preaching in town after town, hearing confessions for hours, and distributing books and leaflets by the thousand. Butler says that over his life he is reckoned to have preached 10,000 sermons and published 200 books or pamphlets. In Barcelona he founded the Librería Religiosa, a religious publishing house that did immense good in reviving the Catholic spirit of Spain. Butler adds that he was associated with Joaquina de Vedruna de Mas in the work of her Carmelites of Charity.

His zeal drew other priests, and in 1849 he gathered five of them at the seminary of Vich: Stephen Sala, Joseph Xifré, Dominic Fábregas, Manuel Vilaró and Jaime Clotet. In his Autobiography he tells how, on 16 July 1849, the feast of Our Lady of Mount Carmel, they began together their own Spiritual Exercises, and how he based his first sermon on the words of the psalm, "Thy rod and thy staff, they have comforted me". That day is counted as the birth of the Missionary Sons of the Immaculate Heart of Mary, known after him as the Claretians, later approved by the Holy See. The name says everything about his piety: his missions were placed under the Immaculate Heart of Mary, to whom he entrusted all his work.

Archbishop of Santiago de Cuba

Only weeks after this foundation, he learned that he had been named Archbishop of Santiago de Cuba. He was consecrated at Vich in October 1850 and sailed for Cuba. He made pastoral visitation after visitation of his vast diocese; he made it easier for the poor to set their marriages in order and so escape concubinage; he opposed the abuses he found, and he made enemies. Butler speaks of "a powerful organization of disorderly and anti-Christian fanatics" who resisted his reforms. There were several attempts on his life.

The most famous took place at Holguín on 1 February 1856. He tells it himself in the Autobiography. He had just preached for an hour and a half on the eve of the Purification. As he walked back through the crowd, a man stepped forward as if to kiss his ring and struck at his throat with a razor; because his head was bent and his hand raised to his mouth, the blade instead "slashed my face across the left cheek, from the ear to the chin", cutting to the bone, and wounded his arm. He felt, he writes, an immense joy at having shed his blood "for the love of Jesus and Mary". The assassin was condemned to death, and it was the archbishop's own intercession, Butler records, that obtained the remission of the sentence.

Confessor of Queen Isabella II

In 1857 he was recalled to Spain to become confessor to Queen Isabella II, and he resigned his Cuban see. He accepted the post under obedience but, Butler notes, lived at court no longer than his duties required, and spent the rest of his time preaching and spreading good books. As rector of the Escorial he founded a science laboratory, a museum of natural history, and schools of music and languages. When the revolution of 1868 drove the queen into exile, he went with her.

He then went to Rome, where at the First Vatican Council (1869-1870) he supported the definition of papal infallibility. An attempt was made to bring him back to Spain; it failed.

Miracles and mystical graces

Butler writes that his continual union with God was rewarded "not only in the way of ecstasies and the gift of prophecy, but also by the miraculous cure of bodily diseases". Two graces he recorded himself are especially remembered.

After the attack at Holguín, a salivary fistula that the doctors judged permanent closed suddenly while he prayed to Our Lady, the day before a painful operation. And the wound on his arm healed, he says, in a raised scar in the shape of Our Lady of Sorrows, visible for about two years.

The second grace is greater. On 26 August 1861, at seven in the evening, while praying in the church of the Rosary at La Granja, he wrote that "the Lord granted me the great grace of keeping the sacramental species intact within me and of having the Blessed Sacrament always present, day and night, in my breast". This is his own testimony, given out of obedience in a private document; the Church canonized him for his heroic virtue, not to guarantee every mystical experience he recorded. It explains, though, the burning love of the Holy Eucharist that marked his preaching.

The Apostolic Prayer of St Anthony Mary Claret

The prayer most associated with him is the short "Apostolic Prayer" from his Autobiography (no. 233), which sums up his whole programme: to know, love, serve and praise God, and to make Him known, loved, served and praised by all.

O my God and my Father, may I know you and make you known; love you and make you loved; serve you and make you served; praise you and make all creatures praise you. Grant, my Father, that all sinners be converted, all the just persevere in grace, and all of us attain to eternal glory. Amen.

The prayer of his feast (Missal of 1962)

The Collect of his Mass is the Church's own prayer on his day. It recalls both his "apostolic virtues" and the new religious families, of clerics and of virgins, that God gathered through him, and it asks for his one passion: the salvation of souls.

Collect of the feast, 23 October

Deus, qui beátum Antónium Maríam Confessórem tuum atque Pontíficem, apostólicis virtútibus sublimásti, et per eum novas in Ecclésia clericórum ac vírginum famílias collegísti: concéde, quǽsumus; ut, eius dirigéntibus mónitis ac suffragántibus méritis, animárum salútem quǽrere iúgiter studeámus. Per Dóminum nostrum Jesum Christum, Fílium tuum: qui tecum vivit et regnat in unitáte Spíritus Sancti Deus, per ómnia sǽcula sæculórum. Amen.

O God, who didst raise blessed Anthony Mary, Thy Confessor and Bishop, to the heights of apostolic virtue, and through him didst gather new families of clerics and of virgins in Thy Church: grant, we beseech Thee, that, guided by his counsels and helped by his merits, we may ever strive to seek the salvation of souls. Through our Lord Jesus Christ, Thy Son, who liveth and reigneth with Thee in the unity of the Holy Ghost, God, world without end. Amen.

Those who wish to prepare for his feast can pray the Collect and the Apostolic Prayer for nine days before 23 October, joined to the novena to the Immaculate Heart of Mary that he would surely have recommended, or to the Litany of the Immaculate Heart of Mary.

St Anthony Mary Claret feast day

In the calendar of 1962 his feast is kept on 23 October. In the Missal and Breviary of 1962 it is a feast of the third class, in white vestments, with the Mass Sacerdotes tui from the Common of Confessor Bishops and a proper Collect. In the reform of 1969 the feast was moved to 24 October, the day of his death. In the calendar of 1962, which is the calendar of this app, it stays on 23 October; see our traditional Catholic calendar of 1962 feasts.

How did St Anthony Mary Claret die?

Exiled and in failing health, he took refuge in France at the Cistercian abbey of Fontfroide, near Narbonne, where a fatal illness overcame him. He died there on 24 October 1870, at the age of sixty-two, among the monks who had sheltered him. He was beatified by Pope Pius XI on 25 February 1934 and canonized by Pope Pius XII on 7 May 1950.

What is St Anthony Mary Claret the patron saint of?

No single papal decree assigns him a long list of patronages, but popular devotion honours him as patron of:

• Weavers and textile workers, because he was a weaver himself before the seminary.
• Savings and savings banks.
• The Claretians and the congregations born of his work; the diocese of the Canaries, where he preached as a missionary, also honours him as its co-patron.

Above all he is a model for priests and bishops: everything Butler and his own writings record turns on the Catholic priesthood lived as a mission to save souls. He stands among the Catholic saints of the nineteenth century as a living answer to an age of revolution.

Frequently Asked Questions

Who is St Anthony Mary Claret?

A Spanish priest and bishop (1807-1870), born at Sallent in Catalonia, a weaver turned missionary, founder of the Claretians in 1849, Archbishop of Santiago de Cuba from 1850, confessor of Queen Isabella II, and a Father of the First Vatican Council. He was canonized in 1950.

Where was St Anthony Mary Claret born?

At Sallent, in the province of Barcelona, Catalonia, on 23 December 1807.

When is the feast day of St Anthony Mary Claret?

On 23 October in the traditional calendar of 1962, as a feast of the third class. Since 1969 the reformed calendar keeps it on 24 October, the anniversary of his death.

How did St Anthony Mary Claret die?

Of illness, in exile, at the Cistercian abbey of Fontfroide near Narbonne in France, on 24 October 1870, after the revolution of 1868 had driven him from Spain with the queen.

What miracles are attributed to St Anthony Mary Claret?

Butler records cures of bodily diseases, ecstasies and the gift of prophecy. He himself recorded the sudden healing of his wound after the attack at Holguín in 1856, and the grace, received at La Granja on 26 August 1861, of keeping the Blessed Sacrament present within him.

What is the Apostolic Prayer of St Anthony Mary Claret?

"O my God and my Father, may I know you and make you known; love you and make you loved; serve you and make you served; praise you and make all creatures praise you..." given in full above, from his Autobiography (no. 233).

Did St Anthony Mary Claret write an autobiography?

Yes. He wrote it out of obedience, as he says at its opening; it is the main source for his inner life and for the account of the attack at Holguín.

The Iter Fidei app carries the calendar of 1962 with every feast, the Roman Missal and the Breviary in Latin and English, so you can pray St Anthony Mary Claret's Mass on 23 October. Join early access here.

Sources. Roman Missal (1962), Proper of Saints, 23 October (St Anthony Mary Claret, Bishop and Confessor). Butler's Lives of the Saints, 23 October. St Anthony Mary Claret, Autobiography (nos. 233, 488-490, 573-580, 694).