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Our Patron Saint

Saint Scholastica's values of prayer, work, study, community, reverence and respect are hallmarks of the life of St. Scholastica. She is a great role model to all of us who are a part of the Society of Saint Scholastica Home School Group.

St. Scholastica was outstanding for her simplicity and faith. She spoke to God directly, in reverent familiarity, without complex or elaborate ritual. As an abbess, St. Scholastica instilled in her sisters the necessity of living in accordance with the great Benedictine aim: "That in all things God may be glorified.” The Benedictine sisterhoods flourished under Scholastica and through the years to the present day. She demonstrated great faith and felt that it was more important to tend the needs of others than to follow a rule rigidly. St. Gregory the Great said of St. Scholastica, "She could do more because she loved more.”

St. Scholastica, sister of St. Benedict, consecrated her life to God from her earliest youth. After her brother went to Monte Cassino, where he established his famous monastery, she took up her abode in the neighborhood at Plombariola, where she founded and governed a monastery of nuns, about five miles from that of St. Benedict, who, it appears, also directed his sister and her nuns.

She visited her brother once a year, and as she was not allowed to enter his monastery, he went in company with some of his brethren to meet her at a house some distance away. These visits were spent in conferring together on spiritual matters.

On one occasion they had passed the time as usual in prayer and pious conversation and in the evening they sat down to take their reflection. St. Scholastica begged her brother to remain until the next day. St. Benedict refused to spend the night outside his monastery. She had recourse to prayer and a furious thunderstorm burst so that neither St. Benedict nor any of his companions could return home. They spent the night in spiritual conferences. The next morning they parted to meet no more on earth.

Three days later St. Scholastica died, and her holy brother beheld her soul in a vision as it ascended into heaven. He sent his brethren to bring her body to his monastery and laid it in the tomb he had prepared for himself. She died about the year 543, and St. Benedict followed her soon after. Her feast day is February 10th.

Source: Catholic Online