Patron Saint of Doctors
St. Luke the Evangelist, feast day 18 October
St. Luke the Evangelist is the patron saint of doctors and physicians, with his feast on 18 October. He was a physician himself, and Paul calls him so directly. Saints Cosmas and Damian are also invoked for medicine. AngelGuard publishes why the patronage fits.
Quick facts
Why St. Luke the Evangelist?
This one needs no legend. Paul, writing to the Colossians, refers to Luke as the beloved physician, and that single description is the whole basis of the patronage. It shows in his Gospel. Luke is the evangelist most attentive to bodies and to the sick: he records more healings than the others, he notices details of condition and duration, and his account of the Good Samaritan lingers on the specific care given, oil and wine on the wounds, transport, and payment for continued treatment. He is also the one who preserves the parable of the Prodigal Son and the account of the Annunciation, so his attention to the vulnerable extends well past medicine. He travelled with Paul, wrote the Acts of the Apostles as the second volume of his own Gospel, and is traditionally held to have been a Greek from Antioch and the only non-Jewish author in the New Testament. Saints Cosmas and Damian, third-century twin brothers who practised medicine without charging their patients, are the other traditional patrons of physicians and are named in the Roman Canon of the Mass.
How to ask their intercession
Doctors and medical students commonly ask his intercession at the start of training or before difficult work. There is also a long practice of patients asking for their own doctors by name, which is a quietly generous form of prayer and one most physicians never hear about.