Patron Saint of Sailors
St. Nicholas of Myra, feast day 6 December
St. Nicholas of Myra is the patron saint of sailors, with his feast on 6 December. The patronage predates his transformation into Santa Claus by many centuries. St. Brendan the Navigator and St. Elmo are also invoked at sea. AngelGuard publishes the story behind it.
Quick facts
Why St. Nicholas of Myra?
Long before he became Santa Claus, Nicholas was a bishop in Myra, on the coast of what is now Turkey, and the sea was the world his city lived by. The patronage rests on an account of sailors caught in a storm who called on him and reported that he appeared aboard, took hold of the ropes, and brought the ship through. Whether or not you take the account literally, the effect is documented: harbour churches dedicated to Nicholas appear all along the Mediterranean and then far beyond it, and sailors carried the devotion with them wherever they traded. That is how a bishop from a coastal town in Asia Minor ended up as one of the most widely venerated saints in both East and West, centuries before any connection to gift-giving. The familiar figure came later and by an odd route: his reputation for secret generosity, particularly a story about providing dowries for three impoverished sisters by night, travelled through the Dutch Sinterklaas into the modern Santa Claus. The sailor came first. St. Brendan the Navigator is invoked by voyagers particularly, and St. Elmo is associated with sailors through the electrical discharge at masthead that still carries his name.
How to ask their intercession
Ask before setting out, as with any journey. Fishing communities in many countries still keep a blessing of the fleet, and his feast on 6 December remains a working sailors’ day in ports that have kept the custom.