Nominations for next year’s field of 32 saints are currently being accepted by the Supreme Executive Committee. Yes, in addition to Eastertide, today begins Nominationtide.
But before we get to the main attraction, we encourage you to visit the Lentorium. You can prove your love for Lent Madness by loading up on Lent Madness merchandise, including the Lent Madness 2014 tote bag, the Lent Madness wall clock, some Lent Madness 2014 coasters, a Lent Madness 2014 magnet, and much, much more. And, of course, don't forget to stock up on Charles Wesley or Lent Madness perpetual purple mugs.
And now, on to the main attraction, the call for nominations for Lent Madness 2015!
As always, we seek to put together a balanced bracket of saints ancient and modern, Biblical and ecclesiastical representing the breadth and diversity of Christ’s One, Holy, Catholic, and Apostolic Church.
Inevitably, some will disagree with certain match-ups or be disappointed that their favorite saint didn’t end up in the official bracket. If you find yourself muttering invective against the SEC, we implore you to take a deep cleansing breath. Remember, there’s always Lent Madness 2029.
While the SEC remains responsible for the formation of the final bracket, we encourage your participation in the nominating process. As in past years, we might even listen to some of your suggestions.
As you discern saints to nominate, please keep in mind that a number of saints are ineligible for next year’s “saintly smack down.” This includes the entire field of Lent Madness 2014, those saints who made it to the Round of the Elate Eight in 2013 and 2012, and those from the 2011 Faithful Four. Here is a comprehensive list of ineligible saints. Please keep this in mind as you submit your nominations — which you can do by leaving a comment on this post.
Also, please note that the saints you nominate should be in the sanctoral calendar of one or more churches. We’re open minded. To a point.
Remember that when it comes to saints in Lent Madness, many are called yet few are chosen (by the SEC). So leave a comment below with your (eligible) nomination!
The Field from 2014 (all ineligible)
Mary of Egypt
David of Wales
Ephrem of Edessa
Catherine of Siena
Harriet Beecher Stowe
Alfred the Great
Lydia
Catherine of Alexandria
Antony of Egypt
Moses the Black
Thomas Gallaudet
Joseph of Arimathea
John Wesley
Charles Henry Brent
Christina the Astonishing
Alcuin
Julia Chester Emry
Charles Wesley
FD Maurice
SJI Schereschewsky
Phillips Brooks
Harriet Bedell
JS Bach
Anna Cooper
John of the Cross
James Holly
Nicholas Ridley
Aelred
Louis of France
Thomas Merton
Basil the Great
Simeon
Past Golden Halo Winners (ineligible)
George Herbert, C.S. Lewis, Mary Magalene, Frances Perkins, Charles Wesley
From 2011 — 2013 (ineligible)
Jonathan Daniels
Harriet Tubman
Hilda of Whitby
Luke
Dorothy Day
Li-Tim Oi
Oscar Romero
Enmegahbowh
Emma of Hawaii
Margaret of Scotland
Dietrich Bonhoeffer
Evelyn Underhill
Jerome
Thomas Cranmer
Clare of Assisi
Thomas Beckett
Perpetua
By the way, it's worth remembering that all the talk you hear these days about transparency and accountability is moot for the SEC. We reveal little and answer to no one. So if you don't like the choices that we'll announce at an unspecified future date known only to us (see what we did there?), start your own online devotional.
For now, we wish you a joyous Eastertide and Nominationtide.
985 comments on “Nominations Open!”
Another vote for Pauli Murray- lawyer, poet, author and first African-American woman ordained as Episcopal priest.
Hope is a crushed stalk
Between clenched fingers
Hope is a bird’s wing
Broken by a stone.
Hope is a word in a tuneless ditty —
A word whispered with the wind,
A dream of forty acres and a mule,
A cabin of one’s own and a moment to rest,
A name and place for one’s children
And children’s children at last . . .
Hope is a song in a weary throat.
Give me a song of hope
And a world where I can sing it.
Give me a song of faith
And a people to believe in it.
Give me a song of kindliness
And a country where I can live it.
Give me a song of hope and love
And a brown girl’s heart to hear it.
Pauli Murray
Dark Testament verse 8
St. Elizabeth of Hungary
Blessed Giorgio Frassati
Maria Goretti
Apologies for my earlier off-calendar wish list. I'd like to try again, better informed. I suggest James Weldon Johnson, Washington Gladden, Joseph the Hymnographer, and Cecelia. Yes, I sing. Why do you ask? I'm a proud member of the Washington Gladden Society as well. Thanks for the holy fun.
I would like to nominate three saints for Lent Madness 2017:
Modern-day: Corrie Ten Boom. She and her family were inspired by their Christian faith to rescue Jews in Nazi-controlled Holland during WWII. She and her sister were ultimately imprisoned in Ravensbruck concentration camp where Corrie continued being a powerful witness to the Christian life. I don’t know if she “counts” as a saint, but I did find a biography of her on Faith of the Fathers Saints.
Historical: St. Francis Solano (16th century). He was a Franciscan friar who practiced strict habits of poverty. After much ministry in Spain, he was sent to South America where he was an effective evangelist among the indigenous peoples. He has a wonderful church and monastery dedicated to him in Lima Peru. One tale of his life is that he entered a gathering one Christmas Eve and played his fiddle with such joy that soon everybody there was dancing and celebrating.
Biblical: the Apostle Thomas. I think many people can identify with his doubting, but after he was convinced of the truth of the resurrection he became a powerful witness in the early church.
I would also like to suggest that in the first round of Lent Madness, half of the contests match saints of more or less the same time period against each other. In the other half of the contests, let Madness reign! But that way at least some early saints would progress to the Saintly Sixteen, and some of the more modern saints would be eliminated early rather than filling up the final rounds.
I love Lent Madness.
I like the idea of early round matching of saints from the same comparable time frames. The early saints did seem to not have much chance when matched to modern day saints with better documented histories.
I strongly support this idea!!!
I like this idea of more equable early match-ups too! I also second Thomas the Apostle. If my beloved state of Missouri had a patron saint, he would be it.
I'll 2nd Henri Nouwen & Dorothy Day. Would like to add one more name from last week's Daily Office: Edward Thomas Demby. As the first African American suffragan bishop in the United States, the importance of achieving that office was eclipsed only by the faith, scholarship, and suffering that accompanied it.
St. Jude, who has helped many of us in our ongoing embrace of lost causes. Also known as St. Jude the Obscure.
St. Dymphna, patron saint of those with "nervous disorders," perhaps esp. epilepsy.
Jeannette Piccard, first woman priest in the Episcopal Church. Yes, she was the first of the 11 to be ordained on July 29.
I second the nominations of Merton, Muir, and Mandela--wow, three M's!
Jean Pierre de Caussade gets my nomination because he went about a priestly life quietly and his writings were discovered so long after he had passed. Yet those words have endured! Like this:
"Those who have abandoned themselves to God always lead mysterious lives and receive from him exceptional and miraculous gifts by means of the most ordinary, natural and chance experiences in which there appears to be nothing unusual. The simplest sermon, the most banal conversations, the least erudite books become a source of knowledges and wisdom to these souls by virtue of God's purpose. This is why they carefully pick up the crumbs which clever minds tread underfoot, for to them everything is precious and a source of enrichment."
I nominate Deaconness Nellie McKim. She is not included in Holy Women, Holy Men but I consider her a saint. She was a missionary in Japan in the early part of the 20th century and was called to serve in the Phillippines. During the Japanese occupation of this country during World War II she was interred in one of the concentration camps there. She was very integral to and served as liason for the inmates at this camp. In addition retired Bishop Francis C. Gray of Northern Indiana was a child there & was a witness to her tireless efforts on behalf of those in need. For more information about Ms. McKim please contact Bishop Gray.
Florian, patron saint of firefighters. I have a beer Stein to add to the kitsch round, but the best source of kitsch would be the firemens museum in nova scotia.
Robert Grosseteste, Bishop of Lincoln
ALBERTUS MAGNUS
Mother Teresa of Calcutta
Verna Dozier! Forthright, pull no punches, African American theologian who advocated for the call of the laity.
I nominate Fred Rodgers, Cuthbert, Thurgood Marshall, and Bishop Baraga of Michigan's Upper Penninsula.
Eleanor Roosevelt
Florence Nightingale
Clara Barton
Thomas Clarkson
Mary Breckinridge
Florence Li Tim-Oi
I agree!
Yes, Henry Nouwen
Ditto for Henri Nouwen.
Sr. Thea Bowman
Walter Reuther
I nominate Mother Teresa who will be canonized this September
YES!!!
St. Alban, the protomartyr of Britain
St. Pantaleimon, the unmercenary physician
St. Bruno
Hilda of Whitey
Edward King, bishop of Lincoln
Blessed Edward Pusey of the Oxford Movement
Nicholas Ferrar of Little Gidding
St. John Henry Newman
Margaret Anna Cusack
St. Damien of Molokai
St. Marianne of Molokai
St. John Bosco
I second Nicholas Ferrar.
St. Teresa of the Little Flower
St. John Paul II
St. Katherine Drexel
St. John Neuman
Sergius and Bacchus, paired saints!
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sergius_and_Bacchus
Bruce Cockburn, a modern poet
Cynthia Bourgeault, for her work in the centering prayer movement. Keating is awesome, but Bourgeault is so much more accessible.
Desmond Tutu, Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., Pope Francis
Here's a few more:
St. Isidore (San Isidro). Patron saint of computers
Augustine of Hippo
Raymond Nonnatus
Martin de Porres
Rose of Lima
Mechthild of Madgburg. She was the first to write her visions in German, rather than Latin, and she faced persecution from the religious authorities for her criticism of them. Some say that her work inspired hell in Dante's Inferno and/or a character. Her writing is passionate and sensuous. She was taken in by the nuns at Helfta in her later years and one of her supporters was Gertrude the Great, which would also be a fine choice as well.
St Piran of Cornwall
St David of Wales
William Wilberforce
St. Benedict...St John eudes . St. Ann, st Elizabeth,,mother Theresa,
Can I add Brother Lawrence?
The Brother Lawrence in Romeo & Juliet??
I would like to nominate Julius Nyere, first president of Tanzania and first African head of state to leave office voluntarily. Devote Catholic who brought country together and never had a civil war. also never enriched himself.
Also suggest Thomas Merton.
Janani Luwum
St. Arnold of Metz, patron saint of brewers of beer.