Hail, Saintly Evangelist

                                              "St. Luke displaying a painting of Mary" by Guercino

Today the Church celebrates the feast of St. Luke.  Luke was a companion of St. Paul,  from whom we know that St. Luke was a gentile, and a physician.  Luke was also the only companion of St. Paul not to abandon him during the two years St. Paul awaited martyrdom while imprisoned in Rome.  It is generally believed that the same Luke who was a companion of St. Paul was also the author of the Gospel of St. Luke, as well as the Acts of the Apostles.  Although not an eyewitness to the events of Christ's life, St. Luke was immersed in a milieu which included eyewitnesses.  St. Luke appears to have known St. Mark, the other non-apostolic evangelist, and was very familiar with Mark's Gospel.

Many of the best-loved parables and episodes from the life of Christ are found only in St. Luke's Gospel.  For example, the parable of the prodigal son, the story of Lazarus and the rich man, and the parable of the good Samaritan are found only in St. Luke.  Likewise, the Annunciation, the Magnificat, the woman who washed Jesus' feet with her tears, and the Nativity with angels and shepherds are found only in St. Luke's Gospel.  While the tradition that St. Luke was a painter has never been definitively established, it is certainly true that episodes described only in St. Luke's Gospel have inspired numerous artists over the many centuries since its composition.  

According to a well-attested tradition, St. Luke died in Boetia in 84 AD, and his relics were placed in a tomb at Thebes.  His relics were brought to Constantinople in 357 AD.  After the fall of that city to the Ottomans, St. Luke's relics were purchased from the Ottoman sultan by the despot George of Serbia.   When Serbia was about to fall to the Turks, the relics were sold to to the Venetian Republic, and placed in the basilica of St. Justina in Padua.   In 1992, the Orthodox bishop of Thebes requested that a significant relic of St. Luke be returned to Thebes.  Research conducted on the bones in St. Luke's sarcophagus revealed that they belonged to a man who was five feet, four inches tall, suffered from emphysema,  and who died between the ages of 70 and 85 years of age.  The research also showed that the man had died between 72 AD and 416 AD, which is consistent with what tradition tells us of St. Luke's death.  In response to the request from Thebes, the bishop of Padua returned the rib from nearest St. Luke's heart, which is now kept at St. Luke's original tomb in Thebes.


St. Luke the Evangelist, pray for us.