Nine Days with Saint Leopold
A free novena from Let Go into Love, for the person who is sick and for the people who love them.
What's in the PDF
Nine pages, one for each day. Each page has a verse from the Gospel of Luke, a short reflection, one moment from the life of Saint Leopold Mandić in the order it happened, a prayer you can say out loud, and a line for the person sitting beside the bed. At the front there's a line for the one intention you'll carry through all nine days. At the back, a shorter novena you can begin on any day: before a scan, during a long stay in hospital, in the week a decision has to be made.
How a novena works
A novena is nine days of prayer for one intention, one of the oldest habits in the Church. Choose one thing to ask for and write it down. Pray once a day, at about the same hour if you can. If you miss a day, pick up where you left off. You may ask for healing. You may ask for something else instead: sleep, courage, one good conversation. Both are prayers.
Who was Saint Leopold?
A small, frail Capuchin friar, born in 1866 on the Adriatic coast in what is now Montenegro, who wanted all his life to go home and was asked to stay. He spent decades hearing confessions in a room the size of a wardrobe in Padua. He had a tumor of the esophagus and died in 1942. He was declared a saint in 1983, and in 2020 he was confirmed as the patron of people with cancer in Italy.
Let Go into Love
Ninety days of Scripture and prayer, thirty pages for single hard moments, and a book of prayers, for people with cancer and the people who care for them.