Saint of the day - July 24

Saint Christeena lived during the third century and was the daughter of Urbain, a rich and powerful magistrate of Tyre. Though his lovely daughter had drawn the eyes of several suitors by the time she reached the age of 11-years-old, Urbain wanted her to be a pagan priestess. He was deep in the practices of heathenism and had a number of golden idols, which he distributed among the poor.

He locked Christeena in a room filled with gold and silver idols, then ordered her to burn incense before them.

Christeena often peered at the world outside her window and assumed that there must have been a great creator of the world. Turning to the idols, she came to believe they could only be false as they were forged by man.

She began to pray to the creator of the world and asked him to reveal himself to her. An angel came to Christeena and taught her the Gospel of Christ. The angel called her a bride of Christ but warned she would suffer for her faith.

Knowing the Truth, Christeena smashed the false idols and threw them through the window. When her father came to visit and discovered the missing idols, he questioned her but she refused to speak to him.

Urbain learned of his daughter’s new faith through her servants. Enraged, he began to slap his daughter's face until she began to speak - but her words were to proclaim her new faith and to share the Truth. She also admitted to destroying the idols.

Urbain executed the servants who tended Christeena and beat her before throwing her in prison. Her mother came to the prison and pleaded for her daughter to renounce her faith but Christeena refused.

The next day, Urbain took Christeena to trial and ordered her to worship the pagan gods and beg for forgiveness. Rather than following her father's orders, Christeena held fast to her Christian faith and was ordered to be tortured.

She was tied to an iron wheel above an extreme fire. As she was raked through the flames, her body was burned but she did not die. She was thrown into a prison cell and that night an angel appeared. Her wounds were healed and she was fed food the angel brought with it.

The next day, when her father found her unharmed, he ordered a stone to be tied around her neck and she was thrown into a lake. As she sank, an angel sustained then untied her. When she reappeared above the water, Urbain attributed her survival to sorcery.

He decided to execute her the following morning but that night he died suddenly.

The region's governor was sent to execute Christeena's punishment in her father's stead, but she survived every torture. When fellow believers discovered the miracles, they began to gather at her cell.

During her time in captivity, Christeena converted nearly 300 people until a new governor arrived and resumed her torture. When she survived five days in a red-hot furnace, she was finally beheaded.

Other Saints of the Day
1. Saint John Boste
2. Saint Declan
3. Saint Kinga of Poland
4. Saint Niceta and Aquilinia
5. Saint Vincent

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