Deepertruth: Stand In The Gap With Us And Saint Martin de Porres

Stand In The Gap With Us And Saint Martin de Porres 11/3/2023

Martin de Porres is famous for his miracles, which include multiplying food to help feed the monks and the poor. Many miracles of healing were attributed to his intercession. St. Martin did extreme penance and spent long hours in prayer.

Martin regularly performed miracles. He could levitate, bilocate (appear in two places at once), and communicate with animals. He died a famed and much-revered figure in 1639. Miraculous cures were claimed at his tomb almost immediately after he was interred, which led to a papal enquiry in 1660.

He is the patron saint of social justice, racial harmony, and mixed-race people.

“Father unknown” is the cold legal phrase sometimes used on baptismal records. “Half-breed” or “war souvenir” is the cruel name inflicted by those of “pure” blood. Like many others, Martin might have grown to be a bitter man, but he did not. It was said that even as a child he gave his heart and his goods to the poor and despised.

He was the son of a freed woman of Panama, probably black but also possibly of indigenous stock, and a Spanish grandee of Lima, Peru. His parents never married each other. Martin inherited the features and dark complexion of his mother. That irked his father, who finally acknowledged his son after eight years. After the birth of a sister, the father abandoned the family. Martin was reared in poverty, locked into a low level of Lima’s society.