I have always had a devotion to St. Anthony, even as a small child, as I witnessed the special place he held in the lives of my mother and grandmother. My children and I have faithfully attended Mass on his feast day to thank him for all of our answered prayers throughout the year. In fact, when my son was a toddler, we discovered the shoe he'd lost days before in the Mothers' Room in our parish Church on that day! St. Anthony is wonderful friend. I'm writing now to thank him publicly for the recovery of a small notebook which was very important to me, and which I found in a stack of papers I had already looked through, after praying this Novena. More recently, I am also grateful for the recovery of 2 credit cards and my son's Latin text book!
Thank you J.P. for your stories of lifelong devotion to St. Anthony of Padua. May we all be inspired to turn to God through the intercession of good St. Anthony in any time of need~
He is one of the great saints of the Catholic Church, and one of the beloved--even far beyond Catholics themselves. Untold numbers of people turn to him, still, when there is loss. And strangely--at least strangely in the usual ways of the world--those things often quickly turn up. And often they turn up in the most unexpected--even seemingly miraculous ways. Let the stories begin.
